


With a Twist

by fishyspots



Category: Schitt's Creek
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Banter, Coming Out, M/M, Mutual Pining, POV Alternating, Slow Burn, Sometimes Cocktail Recipes Can Be So Personal, Two Idiots Who Make Different Decisions In Unison
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-09
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:47:57
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 56,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26379061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fishyspots/pseuds/fishyspots
Summary: Eyes on the empty space where all the bars he’s ever been in keep their taps, he gives voice to something he’s been too afraid to say. Something he couldn’t even tell Rachel. “I don’t know what I want.”Patrick looks at David again. His gaze keeps returning to him, like he’s magnetized or something. He’s never watched someone this closely. When they made a drink, that is. At his old bar, the one a few blocks from their old apartment, most of the mixed drinks were half rum, half Coke.David slides the drink across the bar. “Then it might be time to find out.”***Or, Patrick runs away to Toronto. David is the bartender--ahem, mixologist--at the bar he finds nearby.
Relationships: Patrick Brewer/David Rose, Theodore "Ted" Mullens/Alexis Rose
Comments: 471
Kudos: 488





	1. patrick's drink

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies for any bartending inaccuracies--I've had food service jobs, but not that one. 
> 
> Many thanks to [Jess](/users/jessx2231/), [Caite](/users/kindofspecificstore/), and [Sam](https://brighter-than-sunshine.tumblr.com/) for the reads, encouragement, and brainstorming! Thanks to MoreHuman, rockinhamburger, musictoyourlips, swat117, Distractivate, elies, and Likerealpeopledo for their help brainstorming a drink for Alexis. And thanks to [Megan](https://stuck-on-your-heart.tumblr.com/), without whom this story would have stayed a 700-word tumblr text post forever. Since we started talking about a bartender au, we've written over 100k to each other in tumblr DMs (I counted) (actually that's a lot of words, so I estimated). 
> 
> Story is complete except for some minor edits, and I'll be posting on Wednesdays and Fridays until complete.

“What can I get you?”

Patrick sets his phone facedown on the bar. It’s a dark, rich wood, and the half-typed message on his screen reflects back at him off of the varnish before it’s completely snuffed out. “What do you have on tap?”

The bartender does something complicated with his face. His thick eyebrows climb up, toward his hairline. “Have you never been here before?”

Patrick blinks. “How could you possibly know—“

“I can always tell,” the man says gravely. Then he winks. “No, it’s not that. It’s just, this bar only does mixology.”

Patrick wants to curl up and die. So stupid. He’s out of practice when it comes to finding new places. He’s out of practice at a lot of things.

He wants to bang his head against the bar until he forgets this miserable week. He wants to fling himself off of the barstool and start crying. He wants to be embarrassing and dramatic in a way that he never lets himself be.

He wants to keep talking to this bartender, with his thin, gauzy black sweater that hugs his shoulders tightly. He wants to try a cocktail and see if he likes mixology.

“So,” the bartender drawls. He raises an eyebrow and makes an imperious gesture in Patrick’s general direction. “I’m David,” he prompts.

“Patrick.”

“Patrick,” David says. He uses a small set of tongs to put three ice cubes into a silver shaker.

David makes his name sound brand new. Patrick wants to be brand new.

“What do you like, Patrick?”

That’s the million-dollar question. Figuratively speaking, of course. No one would pay a million dollars for that answer, except for him. And after paying the penalty for breaking their lease, he’s miles away from having a million dollars to pay in the first place.

He opts for the short answer. “I usually drink whatever pilsner they have on tap.”

David mimes horror and pours from a bottle of something brown. Patrick thinks he’s making fun of him.

“Hey,” he protests. He’s at least honest enough with himself to admit that there’s no real heat behind it. “It’s easy my way. How long does it take you to make one of those drinks?”

David hums. He pours some more liquid into the shaker and shakes in something else. Patrick doesn’t know how David keeps all of those unlabeled bottles straight in his head. 

David’s long fingers wrap around the cocktail shaker and start shaking. As Patrick watches David move—methodically, surely, like he sees space for himself in the world and he chooses to fill it—something in his shoulders shakes loose.

Eyes on the empty space where all the bars he’s ever been in keep their taps, he gives voice to something he’s been too afraid to say. Something he couldn’t even tell Rachel. “I don’t know what I want.”

Patrick looks at David again. His gaze keeps returning to him, like he’s magnetized or something. He’s never watched someone this closely. When they made a drink, that is. At his old bar, the one a few blocks from their old apartment, most of the mixed drinks were half rum, half Coke.

David’s fighting a smile. Patrick thinks he’s really bad at hiding it. It’s all twisted up in the corner of his mouth, but it’s there. Obvious. His lithe hands are moving again, curling around a short glass with abstract shapes etched around the base. David tips the shaker and pours the drink. He twists an orange peel and drops it in.

Patrick breathes.

David slides the drink across the bar. “Then it might be time to find out.”

***

David tries not to visibly light up when Patrick walks into the bar. It’s the fourth time in two weeks. He must really like that drink.

“Same as usual?” He asks, already grabbing for the earl grey syrup. It had been kind of a fluke the first time, just something that he was trying out. But he’s made it a staple recently.

Patrick smiles. It makes David’s stomach flip; or it would, if David wasn’t a bartender making Patrick a new drink that he’s really excited about. “What ever happened to hello?”

He’s ridiculous. David kind of can’t believe that he exists. “Must have lost it somewhere outside the city limits.” David’s heard enough to know that Patrick’s a transplant. New to Toronto and, it seems, bespoke cocktail bars. He’s a little scared to know how much more he’ll like Patrick once he gets his feet under him. 

“And I don’t suppose me asking for a menu would mean anything.”

“It might.” David pours in the grapefruit juice. Not too much. The drink is all about balance. Precision. “If we had a drink menu. You’re still not too familiar with our concept here, huh?”

“Not yet.” Patrick nods his thanks when David slides his drink toward him. He’s looking at it like it can solve all of his problems. “Maybe you’d better explain it again.”

David can’t tear his eyes away from the way Patrick’s lips close around the glass. He wants to keep talking to Patrick. 

“I know you just want to hear me rant about drink preferences. I will not be baited. Thoughts on the drink?” He asks. It’s important to get feedback from bar patrons, after all. 

“I’ve never had anything like this before.” Patrick’s voice is inscrutable. But then he takes another sip. He’s still tense around the shoulders and the eyes.

“What ever happened to spilling all your issues to the bartender?” David asks. He wants to see Patrick laugh again, or smile, or look at him. He’s not going to think about how not picky he is about those options until Patrick leaves. 

Patrick drinks, then wipes his mouth with a napkin carefully. He taps one finger against the bar. “It’s weird here.” He says it like a confession. If he’s waiting for David to judge him, he’s going to keep waiting. David’s felt a lot worse than weird. 

“Weird how?” He wants to keep Patrick talking. 

“Weird like,” Patrick looks down at the bar. “Weird like I blew everything up to come here. And now I’m sleeping in my friend’s spare room.”

David blinks. That’s more than he was expecting. But it kind of fits, he thinks. Patrick’s been fidgety and anxious every time he’s come in. He must be feeling out of place.

David’s been there. “I know this doesn’t help much now.” He has to work to keep from laughing; it’s ridiculous. He shouldn’t be giving anyone advice. Look at where he is, less than a mile from the career that he was so secure in a few years ago. Mere miles from his parents’ house, or one of them, at least. But more than a few miles away from them, all the same. “But it won’t feel bad forever.”

“My friend keeps trying to get me to talk about it,” Patrick says, talking fast like he might lose his nerve. “And I feel bad that I can’t. I’m sleeping in his apartment, and I think his girlfriend wants me to leave. And I’ve never been this person.”

“First of all,” David says. These words matter; he wants to be careful here. “You’ve always been this person. And this person doesn’t have to talk about it until he’s ready.”

Patrick sips his drink. The lines on his forehead have smoothed out some. They’re still there, of course; David’s not a miracle worker. 

“Another?” David asks. “On the house.”

“I can’t let you do that,” Patrick protests. 

“Well, we’ll have the person who’s ready to talk about it pay, whenever he shows up.” David hopes it’s not desperate. He thinks he’s okay, but he never thought he was needy or too much before, until his partners told him. 

It’s hard to see in the dim light of the bar, but David’s pretty focused, so he sees Patrick press his lips together and raise his light eyebrows. “We’ll have to hold that guy to it.”

***

Patrick floats home in a daze. The drink was amazing, as usual. It was nothing like he thought he’d like. Maybe that was his problem. Maybe he’d been so caught up in what he thought he wanted—Patrick closes that door. He needs all of his energy to deal with his temporary housemates. 

“Patrick!” He hears Ted’s voice before he sees him. He carefully navigates around the boxes Ted let him stash in the hall—he doesn’t deserve Ted—and makes it into the kitchen. Ted’s standing over the stove, stirring something that smells serviceable, if not outstanding. 

“Hey,” Patrick offers. He’s been chipping in on groceries and utilities, but he always feels out of place around mealtimes. “Alexis here?”

“She’s out with some friends who are just in town for a few days. She said something about where she stashed her go bag, but I’m choosing to believe that she was joking.”

Patrick hasn’t known Alexis for long, but he feels like Ted should probably take Alexis seriously. But he’s storing his boxes in Ted’s hallway and sleeping in Ted’s office, so he keeps his thoughts to himself. 

Ted takes the pot off of the heat and nods toward the cabinet. “Do you mind grabbing bowls and spoons?”

Patrick nods. “Living room?”

There’s not really space for a dining table. Or Patrick’s boxes, honestly. He didn’t bring everything up. Most of his things are still at his parents’ house, but Ted had shaken his head when Patrick came in with a duffel and a pillow. When Patrick said he could leave the bigger stuff in his trunk, Ted laughed at him. 

City living. Another thing that he’d never get used to.

After Patrick’s taken a few bites and amended his impression of the food from serviceable to kind of good, actually, there’s a noise at the door and Alexis walks into the apartment wearing an outfit so sparkly that it hurts Patrick’s eyes to look at. 

“Babe!” Ted’s such a puppy. “I didn’t think you’d be back for dinner. There’s food in the kitchen.”

Alexis kicks off her shoes in the general direction of the shoe rack and wanders into the kitchen. She never really moves purposefully. Patrick doesn’t understand a lot of things about her, but that’s one of the big ones. 

“So Patrick,” Ted says, turning the full force of his eager eyes on him, “tell me more about what you’ve been up to lately. I’m sorry I haven’t been as _engaged_ recently. The practice I’m at has me working the most ridiculous hours.”

Patrick winces. Subtlety was never one of Ted’s strong points. Even in college, when Ted got frustrated by the state of the bathroom or the tendency Patrick had to play his music without headphones, he would pout and sigh in Patrick’s periphery until the situation changed. 

“You know, the usual.” Maybe that was the problem. He decides to start with a safe topic. “I’d been working at that same place I did part-time in college, you know, the licensing firm?”

Ted nods. “The one by your parents’ house?”

“That’s the one.” 

“God, I remember being so frustrated that you always went home for the summer. And you never sublet your room, so I always had the place to myself.”

For anyone else, that would have been a blessing. For Ted, who thrives on people and conversation, it must have been miserable. Patrick is spared from answering when Alexis comes back into the room holding a steaming bowl. She navigates around her shoes without picking them up. Patrick can feel his eye twitch. 

“So what have you been up to all day, Patrick?” Alexis asks, more politely than he expects.

“Just fiddling around with my cover letter.” Patrick hates that he doesn’t have a job yet. He feels a rush of lame every night when he sets his alarm. It’s not like he has to get up for anything. It reminds him, every day, that he really didn’t have a plan when he came here. Just a trunk full of stuff and a recently resurrected text chain with his college roommate who had a spare room. “I was going to work out, but I’m used to longer hikes. And I don’t really know any trails in the city.”

“You can come with me to the boxing gym,” Ted offers. “I have a free guest on my membership, and Alexis won’t wear the gloves.”

Alexis wiggles her fingers at them both. 

“Thanks, Ted.” Patrick kind of doesn’t want Ted to give him anything else; he’s already asking for way too much. But he needs to do something with all of the energy closing up his throat and tightening his shoulders.

“Seven tomorrow morning?” Ted asks. 

Patrick nods. At least it gives him a reason to set the alarm.

“Has a nice ring to it.” 

Alexis digs her elbow into Ted’s side. “Did you do anything else today?” She asks.

Patrick is pretty sure Alexis doesn’t find him interesting. But he answers anyway. “I stopped by this bar? It’s like two blocks away from here.”

“The Inn?” Ted perks up, still rubbing the spot Alexis poked. “We go there all the time. Alexis’s brother works there.”

“Oh really?” Patrick asks. “What’s his schedule? I’ll have to say hi next time I’m there.” There’s really only one person Patrick wants to talk to when he’s at the bar, but he can find a minute to talk to another person. Probably. 

“He’s there, like, all the time.” Alexis rolls her eyes. 

It’s Ted’s turn to elbow her, apparently. “He’s been working there for, what? A year and a half, now?” He turns to Alexis. “He started like six months after he left the gallery, right?”

Alexis nods. Her lips are pressed together and turned down. Patrick thinks she looks like a different person when she’s serious. 

“The gallery?” Patrick asks politely. “Did he cater, or something?”

“Something like that,” Ted says quickly. Alexis opens her mouth to say more, but Ted keeps talking. “He’s been in Toronto for a while, right, babe? Went to college here, too?”

“He did,” Alexis confirms. 

Patrick looks at Alexis and thinks about the red soles of her shoes and the car she parks in a heated garage and the way she doesn’t even bother setting an alarm in the morning. He thinks her brother probably didn’t do catering at the gallery.

“What do you get at The Inn, Patrick?” Ted asks. “I usually go for the mocktails.”

“Oh,” Patrick hopes he’s just warm and not blushing. “This bartender made a drink for me, the first time I went. I just keep having him make that? I’m not totally sure what it is.”

“Oh, a bartender,” Alexis winks. At least, Patrick thinks she’s winking. “I can have my brother put in a good word for you, if you want. He’s kind of a trash gremlin, but he’d do it.”

Patrick laughs. “Maybe. That could...” He clears his throat. He’s not sure why the thought of involving another person in this new friendship—maybe acquaintance, but that word doesn’t sound right either—feels like such a monumental step. Still, there’s a swoop in his stomach. With Rachel, they’d been friends for years. And he doesn’t have a poker face, so she knew months before he worked up the courage to ask her out. The thought of Rachel congeals in his stomach. He really needs to talk to her, and he’ll do it. He owes her that. Tomorrow, probably. “That might be okay. Eventually.” He’s learned that Alexis works best with clear boundaries. She still breezes past them in a wave of floral perfume and gold jewelry, but she at least acknowledges them. “Tonight, I just want the drink.”

“We could go now,” Alexis says, standing up. “I need, like, a hot twenty to change, but then we could go?”

Ted shrugs. “I could go.”

Patrick doesn’t want to be a creep and go twice in one day, but he doesn’t want to bring down the mood. And a part of him, which Patrick hopes is smaller than it feels, really does want to see David again. He goes to grab his shoes, pointedly stumbling over Alexis’s heels on the way.

A very cool thirty-five minutes later, the three of them are sliding into one of the high-top booths a few feet from the bar. Ted and Alexis sit on the same side, the one facing the bar, more tangled up in each other than they are on the couch sometimes. Patrick’s alone on his side. 

“I can go get the drinks,” he volunteers.

But Alexis is waving her hand, presumably at her brother. “You’re so sweet, but I’ve got it.”

“I thought I told you I would refuse you service the next time you waved me down,” Patrick hears the voice behind him, that voice he’s spent an embarrassing amount of time listening to, and thinking about, and dreaming about once, he’s pretty sure.

And a few things click into place at once. David, _his_ David—okay, the David he’s been talking to, not _his_ David—is Alexis’s brother. The David he’s been talking to used to work at a gallery, no doubt doing something high-concept and way out of Patrick’s league. And David, who is most certainly not a trash gremlin, whatever that means, is seeing him for the second time today.

***

“Can I get an LBA?”

David wants to scream. It’s only partially because Alexis is on his last nerve in record time; most of the feeling comes from the sight of Patrick for the second time today. David thought he did pretty well earlier, all things considering. But now the traces of the vodka he spilled all over his sleeve earlier are probably still visible, and he can feel a few strands of his hair sticking to his forehead. “As I keep reminding you, no one knows what that drink is. It was on your show for, like, two episodes. Sorry I didn’t take notes.”

Alexis looks like she’s seconds away from stamping her foot. “For the millionth time, it’s just gin and lemon. And club soda.”

“That’s a gin fizz,” David says flatly, leaning into the table. His feet are killing him.

But Alexis, probably sensing that she’s not going to get any more from David, has turned to Patrick, who’s apparently the guy sleeping in their office, the one she said was cute but too earnest. Not for the first time, David had to bite back a comment about how Alexis lives with Ted, so he didn’t think that she even registered earnestness anymore. 

“You have to try a Little Bit Alexis,” Alexis tells Patrick. “It’s the sweetest little drink. When David makes it right.”

David does not bean Alexis with an olive from the bar, but it’s a near thing.

Ted pats David’s arm. David thinks he’s too earnest to be real. 

“Yes, Ted?”

“Can I have that Madonna drink?”

“Yes, Ted.”

Ted smiles at him. As usual, David has no idea what to do with that, so he smiles back. “Patrick, same drink?” He asks. 

Ted and Alexis both turn to look at Patrick. Alexis looks like she does when she’s mocking David. Because that doesn’t bode well, David nods when Patrick does and heads back to the bar to get their drinks started. It’s the work of just a few minutes—Alexis’s drink is infuriatingly routine, and he’s got some practice making Patrick and Ted’s more complicated choices. 

When he brings the drinks back to the table, Ted’s talking about the Madonna drink. David wants to melt into the floor. This story is embarrassing. Mostly for Ted, but a little bit for him, too.

“And there’s a lucky lime star,” Ted says proudly. 

Patrick is looking at David. “I didn’t know you were so into puns.”

“It is not a pun.” David knows he sounds defensive, but puns are just horrifically off brand for him. “It’s wordplay at most.”

“That’s what he said to me, too.” Ted takes a sip of the drink. “But it’s at least two kinds of wordplay, so I allow it.”

Patrick nods. “Wise.” 

Then David has to look away. It’s one thing to watch Patrick when it’s just the two of them, but he would rather set himself on fire than give Alexis anything else to bother him about. The list is long enough already.

“Your gin fizz,” he says, pushing Alexis’s drink toward her. 

She sticks out her tongue at him, because she’s apparently five years old.

He huffs and shoots a bemused smile to Patrick, then goes to make a drink for Ronnie. She doesn’t like to be kept waiting. 

***

“Ugh, he’s so prickly lately.” Alexis takes a drink and hums, then holds her glass out to Patrick. “Want to try?”

He does. It tastes like a gin fizz. “Really good,” he says.

Ted bounces in his seat. “So you said that your bartender made you a special drink.”

Patrick wants to crawl under the table. “Mm hm.”

“And David made you your drink tonight.” Alexis tilts her head at him. They’re an effective double team. 

Patrick just nods and tips his glass back for a long drink.

Alexis pats Patrick’s hand. “We don’t have to talk about that tonight,” she says. It’s surprisingly nice of her. 

Patrick lets out a breath. “Thanks. I’d appreciate that.” He feels like an exposed nerve, all open to be poked and unsure if he’d survive the experience. 

“But, just in case.” Ted says. Apparently they aren’t done talking about it. “David is great. A great guy.”

And then, miraculously, Ted and Alexis let him steer the conversation to Ted’s work. Apparently he was neutering dogs that morning, and the trauma is still fresh. 

Patrick takes another drink.

There’s someone sitting at the end of the bar who keeps turning to look at their table. Patrick doesn’t remember them from the night before, and he thinks the look in their eyes is closer to derision than it has any right to be for someone whose name he doesn’t know.

He nudges Ted and nods toward the bar. “Do you know who that is?” He asks. 

“Oh, that’s Ronnie.” Ted waves to them. “She’s one of the regulars. Really gets on with David. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her pay for a drink.”

Patrick chances another glance at her. She still looks unimpressed, but she is returning Ted’s wave. 

“Do you talk to her a lot?” Patrick asks. “It’s just, she keeps glaring at me.”

Ted shifts, uncomfortable. “She’s probably glaring at Alexis, actually? Ronnie’s...not a fan.”

Patrick raises his eyebrows. Alexis is a lot, sure, but Alexis and her brother are so similar. It’s hard to believe that mannerisms are the only thing bothering Ronnie about Alexis. But it’s not his place to ask Ted about Alexis, especially when Alexis could theoretically hear them discussing whether this Ronnie woman hates her, if she ever turns back from the bar and stops haranguing David about whether he made her drink with tonic water or club soda. 

He takes in the shining pins on Ronnie's navy blazer. “Is she a pilot?” 

“Works at the embassy. Something to do with foreign relations.”

Patrick shrugs and lets Ted change the subject. But when he looks again a few minutes later, Ronnie’s laughing at something David’s saying. He wonders what it is.

Later, after they’re back from the bar and Patrick has punched his pillow no less than a dozen times to make it more comfortable, after he’s set his alarm and renamed it boxing with Ted, after he’s shifted and rolled and bent to fit into the twin bed he’s sleeping on, Patrick doesn’t think about the usual things. He’s not remembering the way his mom said _Toronto_ when he told her where he was staying, like it was an epithet rather than a city less than eight hours’ drive from where he grew up. He’s not parsing the last voicemail he listened to from Rachel, before he let the red dot stay in place, and the way she said _I don’t get it_ , and meant _I don’t get you_. 

Patrick thinks about David. He thinks about David’s eyes and the way that he smiles with them, even when his lips are bitten-in or pressed together. He thinks about David smiling at Ted almost helplessly, like he didn’t want to be as charmed as he was. He thinks about David sliding a second drink to Alexis without her having to ask. 

He closes his eyes. Every night, he’s either screamed into his pillow or thought about doing it. All the bad and wrong and different push down on him at night. But tonight, he leaves the pillow where it is. 


	2. call me madonna

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to [Kia](/users/kiashyel/) for her help brainstorming about David and Ronnie!

A couple of weeks later, Patrick is still thinking about David before he goes to sleep. And when he wakes up. But it’s the worst in moments like this one, when he’s at the bar and David’s right there in front of him in his inexplicable sweaters. 

He and David have talked about lots of things since the first night Patrick came in and bared his soul like some kind of emotional flasher, but for all he’s listened to David’s diatribes against fringe as a fashion concept and people who say they don’t have any food intolerances but then lash out when he makes something with egg whites, he still thinks David is an enigma wrapped in black-and-white cashmere. 

Patrick wants to know more about David. Everything about David, except that’s creepy and not really something he’s entitled to. “Ted mentioned you’d been working here for a year and a half, or thereabouts?” He asks, watching David carefully for a reaction where he’s wiping down the bar.

David hums but does not look up from his task. “That’s correct.” 

Patrick thinks about buying him a drink, but then he remembers the way David’s nose had turned up when a different customer offered the same thing the week before. 

Maybe if he starts with something about himself, he thinks. “I’m still looking for a job out here.” He swallows. “I didn’t really come with a plan.”

“But you did make the trip.” Patrick wants to wrap himself up in David’s words and the soft, knowing way that he says them.

“I know you have opinions on customers buying you a drink, because they’re free for you—”

David waves him off. “I’ll make myself a mocktail, how about that? Because I want to. Not because you’re buying it for me.”

Patrick bites his lip. David’s so stubborn, but in a way Patrick recognizes. He makes Patrick feel seen, but not like he’s a bug under a microscope. Like they’re both standing in the light. 

David’s gathering ingredients, putting a spring of something green and a lime cutout Patrick recognizes into a glass. “That’s Ted’s drink, right? The wordplay one?”

David nods. “He had an early thing when he was in here a month or two back and needed something without alcohol. I will not be dignifying the wordplay allegation with a response.”

Patrick fights his smile; the force of it might scare David. “Cyndi Lauper, I think he said?”

“Madonna.” David speaks before he thinks, then glares at Patrick. 

Patrick hums a few bars. “Made it through the wilderness.”

David drinks. “I changed my mind. You did buy me this drink.”

Patrick has always teased people. It’s encoded in his DNA. This feels different, though. “Somehow, I’ll make it through.”

“It was an expensive drink, too. I charge Ted two hundred dollars.”

“No one could do that to Ted.”

“Fine,” David says. “I do have a heart.”

“Have you always made drinks like this?” Patrick asks, gesturing with his own glass. He’s still not tired of the drink David made for him that first night. Maybe he’ll order something else eventually, but this is still his favorite.

David shook his head. “A recent thing, if you can believe it. I didn’t really get into it until I got this job.”

Patrick files that information away in his mental David folder. “You’re a fast learner.”

“In some respects, maybe,” David allows.

Patrick slots in _bad at taking compliments_ , too. 

A woman with dark hair pulls out the stool next to Patrick. The bar’s not even that crowded; Patrick fights back his irritation at having to share David’s attention. He doesn’t know why it’s bothering him so much. 

Everything is bothering him so much. He feels out of control and prickly and silly. Worst of all, he knows he’s being unreasonable. Since he was old enough to know what parts of himself were the important ones, he’s prided himself on being dependable and logical. Friends came to him in college for advice about relationships and family problems and talking to professors. Rachel used to call him the decision machine, and only sometimes when they were fighting, because he could cut through all of the emotion underlying a choice and get to what was best. At least what a twenty-year-old with no concept of a world outside the one he was trying to fit himself into thought was best. 

“Excuse me,” she says, voice pitched high in a way that’s obviously fake. “Could I get some service, please?”

Patrick just sips. David’s pretty adept at handling customers like this one. And it’s always fun to watch him do it, all sarcasm and painted-on smiles. 

“Sorry,” David says flatly. “We don’t serve goblins with mismatched towels.”

The woman laughs and drops the voice. “David, I set a perfectly reasonable budget for new towels. It’s not my fault you don’t like the polka dots.”

“I want to live in your world, where bleach stains are polka dots.” David’s making a drink for this woman without asking what she wants. Patrick feels a flash of something that is definitely not jealousy.

The woman turns to look at him. “Patrick.” It’s not a question.

“I’m so lost,” he admits. “And you are?”

She puts a hand on her chest. “David hasn’t mentioned me, his roommate, his sounding board? I am offended. I require a more elaborate drink. To cope.”

“I require better towels to cope,” David shoots back. 

Stevie. This is Stevie. “You’re Stevie.”

“Because you clearly have mentioned me, David, I am generously knocking the difficulty level down from a six to a four.”

David sets a glass in front of Stevie, clinks his own against it, and glares.

“Do we get better drinks for perceived slights?” Patrick asks. “Because the other day, David, you didn’t say hi to me for like five minutes.”

“I am not engaging with your antics.” David says. He does grab Patrick’s empty glass, though.

“And you know, if you could throw in one of those paper umbrellas?" Patrick can't keep the laughter out of his voice. He's not used to the way it sneaks in. "I just feel like that would tie it all together for me." 

Patrick recognizes the look on Stevie’s face. He’s pretty sure he’s wearing the same one.

"You know what," Stevie says, gesturing toward her own glass, "I did feel like there was something missing from mine, too. Maybe a maraschino cherry?" 

David’s eyes narrow. It’s even better because he’s clearly trying to fight it. 

"Might I suggest," he says brightly, as he sticks a lemon peel into Stevie’s drink and a swizzle stick into Patrick's, "that the two of you might be better suited to The Old Spaghetti Factory?" 

Patrick and Stevie look at each other, like they're in an old Western, but like, for teasing. 

"Turning away paying customers," Stevie says. 

"We just want to be a part of your world," Patrick adds. 

"This is the worst shift I've worked since I had to talk Wendy out of selling yard-long drinks on lanyards."

Patrick props his chin on his hand. “That actually would be a really good idea,” he muses.

“This is so fun for me, being harassed at work like this.” David makes Stevie another drink. “Whiskey sour. You don’t get anything more involved until you’re nice to me.” 

Stevie accepts her drink. “I love whiskey sours.” She slides the drink around the bartop, spreading condensation. “You know what would be really fun?” She asks. 

“This ending?” David says hopefully.

“Tropical drinks.” She nods decisively. “To make good use of all those umbrellas.”

Patrick hasn’t had this much fun in years. The thought threatens to make him sad if he thinks about it for too long. “Pineapple juice,” he suggests. “Coconut.”

“I could cut both of you off, you know,” David says. “Or make you pay full price for your drinks.”

Stevie puts a hand on her heart. “You would never.”

Patrick is too busy parsing the brand new information that he’s been getting a discount. He’s a little scared to lose it. These drinks are already pretty expensive, even with his apparent discount. 

Still, he says, “Free leis with every pitcher.” The face David makes is worth the potential hit to his wallet. The smile Stevie gives him isn’t bad, either. 

***

“We don’t have all of the toppings here for me to show you the best way to have popcorn, but it’s still pretty good.” David’s shaking a bag of the microwaved stuff into a bowl. 

“I’m intrigued. What exactly are you missing?” Patrick’s leaning against the fridge in David and Stevie’s kitchen. He hasn’t stopped looking around since David let him in fifteen minutes ago; David’s feeling pretty exposed, honestly. 

“Sour gummy worms. And butterscotch. Chips or sauce. I’m not picky.” David hopes Patrick won’t take the bait, even though it’s low-hanging fruit. He doesn’t have the energy to be teased about how high-maintenance he is tonight.

Patrick doesn’t laugh. Instead, he makes a noncommittal noise and grabs the bowl when David holds it out to him. 

David settles onto the couch, flopping down ungracefully. “This day was so long, it’s unreal.”

Patrick hums sympathetically. He sits down next to David. Not at the opposite end of the couch; there’s only one bowl for the popcorn. “Want to tell me about it?”

“‘I love spicy things,’” David changes the pitch of his voice and makes a face. He hated this customer. “‘I love them so much. I always order spicy food. My friends think I’m crazy.’” He drops the impression. “So I made her a drink with jalapeño. Not a lot, even, because I thought it would be too much. But like, a little bit of heat.”

“She wasn’t a fan?”

David rolls his eyes. “She was not a fan.”

“Dumb.”

David nods. “At least it’s better than that proposal we had last week. Did I tell you about that one?”

“I think I would remember your opinions on a bar proposal.”

David’s breath catches for a second, but he breaks land speed records to breeze past the implications of Patrick’s words. “This guy came in and asked me to hide a ring in a glass of red wine for his girlfriend that night.” He shudders, hoping that Patrick will sense how wrong that decision was on multiple levels. 

“Just handed it over to you?” Patrick asks. 

“Right?” David had been surprised, too. “And then he just left the building. Said to save them seats at the bar that night.”

Patrick tilts his head. “Did you actually put a ring—a diamond ring—in a glass of wine?”

“It went against all of my better judgment and sense of romance, but I did what he asked.”

Patrick snorts. “Did she say yes, at least?”

“She smiled so wide when she put on that pink-tinted ring.” It had been sweet, the way the woman’s arms wound around the luckiest idiot David had ever met. “Because, of course, the ring was stained. And then the guy had the nerve to ask me if I knew that the ring would change colors like that.”

“Of course he did. And?”

David feels important when he has all of Patrick’s attention. For the first time in too long to think about, he relishes the heat of the spotlight. It doesn’t burn like it did when he did pageants and infomercials. “And I told him that gee, I didn’t make a habit of drinking merlot with metal in it usually. I was just as surprised as he was.”

Patrick shakes his head. “I shudder to think what Wendy would do without you.”

“I’m almost positive that’s a compliment, and I will take it as such. So thank you.”

When Patrick holds out the remote, David pushes it back toward him. 

“Put on whatever you want.” It shouldn’t feel momentous. It’s something a good friend would do. He’s done it for Stevie before, he’s pretty sure. At some point.

***

Patrick’s sitting alone at the bar, and it’s not creepy or weird. 

Totally not. Even if David’s usually there talking to him, but he’s not for some reason. Patrick’s never been an eating alone person; honestly, he once got back together with Rachel because of a harrowing experience at the Cheesecake Factory when his ordering and subsequent consumption of an entire plate of avocado egg rolls led the server to ask when his friend was coming. 

But this is fine. Patrick sips his drink. Then he sips his drink again. 

The woman—Ronnie, he thinks—who glared at him that one time walks in, sets her briefcase down, and all but collapses onto a stool at the other end of the bar. She’s clearly coming from work. Patrick spots a couple of pins gleaming on her lapel. 

To his surprise, Ronnie breaks the silence first.

“So, you’re living with David’s sister.” She arches an eyebrow. She really must spend a lot of time talking to David.

Patrick almost chokes on his drink in his rush to answer her. “Her boyfriend is my old roommate. I’m staying in their spare room.”

“Surprised that Alexis is so welcoming.” There’s something that Patrick might call concern in Ronnie’s voice, if he’s optimistic. 

Patrick does his best bobblehead impression. “She’s great. They’ve been great.”

“Are you from around here?” Ronnie asks. Her eyes are burning a hole in his forehead, but at least someone’s talking to him. 

“New Hamburg, actually.” 

“Quite a drive. Why’d you move? Just need to see a few more people and a few less farm animals?”

“A change. I just needed a change.” Patrick doesn’t know what Ronnie is looking for, but she nods like she’s found it, whatever it is. 

“Good place for that.”

“You too?” Patrick asks. 

Ronnie looks away from Patrick as David slides a drink across the bar to her. 

David stays for only a second, waving at them both and darting back into the kitchen while mouthing _Wendy, sorry_.

When Patrick turns away from watching David, Ronnie’s studying him.

“Did you know David before you came to Toronto?” she asks.

“Just met him here at the bar. I didn’t even know he was Alexis’s brother until we all came here together.” Patrick laughs.

Ronnie doesn’t. She mumbles something under her breath about how making conversation isn’t worth the free drink, but Patrick might mishear her. He hopes.

David comes back then, which saves Patrick from single-handedly salvaging this conversation. He still doesn’t know if Ronnie likes him. It’s frustrating.

“Sorry.” David smiles. “Wendy was thinking about selling bathtub gin, but like, that has to be illegal. Not to mention the fact that it’s trashy. And probably very unsanitary.” 

He gestures toward the empty glasses in front of Patrick and Ronnie. “Refills for you both?”

“Thanks,” Ronnie says. 

Patrick does the same. “I never asked how you two know each other,” he says.

David’s hand stills over the fruit garnishes. “Oh, Ronnie and I have known each other for a while. When did we meet, the early 2010s?”

Ronnie hums and drums her knuckles against the table. “When Alexis was thirteen.”

“That’s right. God, I forget where she even was that time.” David laughs, but it sounds hollow to Patrick’s ears. 

Ronnie rolls her eyes. “She had just gotten out of Hong Kong, so maybe Singapore?”

“That sounds right.”

“Singapore?” Patrick asks. He would do anything to keep them talking.

“Alexis modeled for a while when we were younger. Our parents—well, our mom—was dead set on us doing some form of showbiz. She got modeling and I got tap, inexplicably.”

It’s like a treasure trove. Patrick wants to thank Ronnie, but he’s pretty sure she’s not doing this for him.

“And you didn’t travel internationally in pursuit of your craft?” He asks.

David laughs. Ronnie even cracks a smile, he’s pretty sure. But it’s dim in the bar.

After Patrick and Ronnie’s third and fourth drinks, respectively, Patrick pays his tab and David waves off Ronnie’s attempts to do the same. 

She nods at David. “Tell that sister of yours to give me a heads up if she decides to jet set again.”

David nods and clears the empty glasses. When his back is turned, Ronnie slides a hefty tip across the bar. She’s out the door before David can protest. 

Patrick is so, so intimidated by her.

***

“We finally decided to start speaking your language since our earlier attempts were, well, not well-received.”

David pinches the bridge of his nose. He’s been awake for twenty hours, his feet are staging a mutiny, and the gift basket of cookies his parents left for him is all melty and stuck together. “Okay, well I’m sorry that texts telling me that I was being dramatic didn’t win me over. Also, I resent the implication that the only way to get my attention is dessert.”

His dad makes a disbelieving noise over the phone. “We just know you like Levain, and your mother—uh, we, together, collectively—figured it had probably been a while for you. And I was in New York for a meeting on Tuesday.”

David doesn’t want to admit that his dad is right. His days of hopping or chartering a plane just to satisfy a chocolate craving are long gone. 

“And we haven’t heard from you for a while.” His dad prattles on about his mother’s nerves and the family friends who have asked after him since last year’s Christmas party. 

David tunes him out as he hunts through the basket for a cookie that hasn’t crumbled in transit. Stevie wanders into the kitchen and wrinkles her nose at the sound of David’s dad droning on over speakerphone. He placates her with a white chocolate macadamia nut cookie. She nods, satisfied.

“David?” his dad asks. “Did you hear me?”

“Sorry, dad. You’re breaking up. And I can’t afford better service, so who’s to say when you’ll be able to get through again.”

“Now really, David —” 

David hangs up and takes a bite of a chocolate chip cookie. Fuck, they’re better than he remembers. 

***

Patrick looks up at the tap on the office’s door frame. He’s been staring at his email for what feels like an eternity.

“Ted’s gone.” Alexis raises her eyebrows. 

Patrick narrows his eyes. “And when is he coming back?”

“ _Patrick_. He’s staying late tonight to shadow a couple of business meetings.” 

“You’re sure?” Patrick checks. They’ve been burned before.

Alexis nods. 

“I’ll grab the marshmallows. Do you know where he hid the sticks?”

“Ted has never once been able to keep a secret from me.”

Patrick gets up. This can be his reward for sending off all those applications. Maybe it can also be his reward for texting Rachel back. He only answered one of her millions of questions, but still. So what if it was just about their lease.

Alexis turns on the range. “I still don’t get why Ted thinks this is dangerous.”

Patrick tugs at one of the tassels of her necklace, which is an inch or two too close to the flame. “No idea,” he says innocently. 

“Do we have chocolate graham crackers?” Alexis asks as she takes off her necklace.

“Don’t we always?”

“I didn’t know if Ted confiscated those, too.”

Patrick opens the cupboard where he keeps his tea and Alexis keeps her protein powder. He rummages around in the back until he finds the graham crackers and chocolate. “Can’t take what he can’t find.”

Alexis pokes his nose. He blinks.

“Boop.”

Okay, he thinks. He turns his attention back to the marshmallows and lights a burner on the stove. Alexis has already made it clear that she can’t be in charge of the flame.

“What did you do all day?” Alexis asks. “I was going to ask you if you wanted to come to a juice bar with me, but you were, like, laser-focused on your computer earlier.”

“Job applications,” Patrick sighs. “I need to find something to do.”

Alexis is looking at him. Patrick wishes she was looking at her marshmallow. If it falls into the range, they’re toast. “How do you know?” 

“Know what?”

“What to do. What the something you’re going to do is.” She’s watching the flame more closely now. 

Patrick studies her. “I think about what I’m good at,” he says slowly. “And I think about what makes me excited. What I like to do.”

“But you like to do,” Alexis waves a hand. Unfortunately, it is the hand holding the stick. By some miracle, the marshmallow does not hit the wall. “Spreadsheets. Useful stuff.”

“I like to organize,” he corrects. “Making spreadsheets is just one way to do that.”

“I don’t think anything I like would be useful.” 

“You like to spread the word.” Patrick doesn’t like to hear Alexis talk like that about herself. He’s seen her read books in two days flat and heard her give advice that’s surprisingly insightful about the social media accounts of Ted’s practice. “You like to make things better.”

Alexis bites her lip.

“That’s something. Maybe,” he clears his throat. He can’t tell if he’s overstepping, but he’s already come this far. He takes one more step. “You’d be really good at public relations, or something like it.”

“I wouldn’t know where to start.”

Patrick isn’t going to bully her into this. “Well, if you want to know. You know where I sleep.”

Alexis’s eyes dart between her marshmallow, her shoes, and Patrick. It’s quiet until she lands back on the marshmallow. “Thanks.”

Patrick shrugs. He didn’t do anything. He rotates his stick a few degrees. Even coverage is key. He clears his throat. “So David said he didn’t make drinks before he worked at the bar.”

“I mean, he used to have people for that kind of thing.” Alexis blows to put out her marshmallow, which is on fire because she’s a heathen who likes it burnt. 

Patrick frowns. “He had a person specifically to make him drinks?”

“Ugh, no, Patrick. He just didn’t worry about making his own drinks, is all.” Alexis is looking at him like he’s the one who isn’t making sense.

Still, he thinks he might be able to get a bit more information. Push a bit further. There’s something hungry that comes out when he thinks about David. He wants to know everything. “What did he do before the bar? That gallery, you said?”

Alexis rolls her eyes. “He had a cute little gallery here. Until he went ballistic on our parents and left it.”

“Here?” Patrick asks. He grabs Alexis a graham cracker and breaks off two rows of chocolate. It’s not technically a bribe. He might do it if he wasn’t pumping her for information. 

“Toronto,” Alexis confirms. She holds out her marshmallow to Patrick and almost takes out his eye with the stick. 

Patrick juggles his own stick and Alexis’s s’more, then hands hers over. His still isn’t fully toasted, because he has standards. He thinks about what he’s doing right at that moment. He has standards about some things. 

“It was a surprisingly cute gallery,” Alexis muses. Her face and hands are sticky. Patrick looks at her and thinks about his first impression of the woman in the dress made of glitter. It’s surprising how much he likes her. 

Alexis widens her eyes at him. “Patrick, get your marshmallow,” she urges. He looks, and it is indeed on fire. “Like, now. If you ruin this for us, I’ll never forgive you.”

***

“David, we simply cannot deprive our public of another year of song and holiday merriment.”

David huffs and contemplates dropping the phone, or maybe hanging up on his mom. Then he shudders. The fallout might actually kill him. “Absolutely we can. I choose to deprive them. It's a mercy, honestly.”

“David!”

“It’s also _October_.” He rolls his eyes, even though his mom can’t see him. “Isn’t it a touch too early to start planning this? You used to only make me start rehearsing the week before.”

“Well, since you elected to take a sabbatical last year, I am certain you require additional preparation.”

David takes a breath and holds it, trying to calm his frustration. His parents hadn’t checked in since the cookies; he really thought they might apologize this time. Stupid. 

“Now,” his mom changes tacks, “have you received the electronic representation of the new arrangements among which I am vacillating? There are more solos in it for you.”

“First of all, even if I were coming, which I am not, I do not want any more responsibility for what I inflict on unsuspecting partygoers than I used to have.”

“You won’t be gracing us with your presence?” His mom’s voice is icy. 

“I think I have to work,” David says weakly. 

The sound of his mom hanging up, when it comes, is entirely expected.

***

He knew it was coming, but it still turned his stomach to see the nonsense letters appear on his screen. 

That night, when he throws the whole message mess onto the counter in front of him, David just hums. “You said she was close with your parents. Maybe get your parents to gently suggest that it’s different this time, but not why?” 

And then Patrick’s flustered for another reason. “They don’t, um.” He clears his throat. “That wouldn’t help.” 

David nods. He seems like he actually gets it, like he won’t make Patrick dig around for the right words and try to arrange them on the bar between them. 

“Okay. That’s hard, then.”

***

“Did you use Meyer lemon in those?”

David finishes the lemon drop martinis and pours them into two glasses. “Sorry, I thought you just wanted citrus, since there’s no real difference between lemon and Meyer lemon. This one won’t cost you three extra dollars.” 

“Three dollars?” Stevie asks. “That’s a big charge, even for this place.” 

David snorts. “I charge you extra because you should know better.” 

Patrick raises his hand. 

“Yes, Patrick?” 

“How much would it cost me?” 

“Two dollars,” David says magnanimously, “because you’re new here, but you’ve been around long enough to hear my opinions by now.” 

Patrick nods. “Stevie, can I buy you a drink?” 

“Two dollars,” David reminds him. 

Patrick nods solemnly. “It’s worth it for that totally unique taste.” 

David shrugs. He warned them.

***

“Did Alexis ask you about the gift exchange yet, Patrick?”

His voice is quiet, a little breathy. Patrick kind of wants to roll around in the sound. 

There are a lot of reasons Patrick shouldn’t entertain that thought. They’re in public, at a bistro with posters wallpapering the walls that David swears up and down has the best sandwiches he’s found under fifteen dollars. And David’s sister is there. It’s not the time. He shakes his head and looks over at Alexis.

“She didn’t. Is this a Christmas exchange? Like a secret Santa?” 

David shrugs. “Alexis and I celebrate both Hanukkah and Christmas, and Stevie only celebrates Cyber Monday. But it’s a holiday thing, yes. Interested?” 

Alexis bounces in her seat. “It’s so fun, Patrick,” she informs him. “Even if David’s being a buzzkill and setting a price limit this year.” 

“Not all of us can still afford Tiffany, Alexis.” 

Patrick nods. “I’d love to, um. Participate.” Patrick’s done white elephant parties before, with the baseball team and Rachel’s friends. But he’s never really done this. “I don’t really think I’m easy to shop for, though.” 

David laughs. “None of us are.” 

Patrick tilts his head, calculating. He sees an opening here, but the food hasn’t come yet. Alexis and David do much better with sincerity when they can fidget and fiddle with something. He takes a breath and takes his chances. 

“I don’t know, David,” he says. “Alexis made it sound like you picked out pretty good gifts.” 

Alexis becomes very interested in the charm dangling from her phone case. 

“Okay,” David says. Like he doesn’t know what else to do.

Silence falls. Patrick probably miscalculated. 

“Like that turquoise necklace,” Alexis says, finally. Patrick breathes. “I really liked that.” 

“I thought you thought mom picked that out,” David said, voice small. “You asked me where she got it from.” 

Having inspected every centimeter of the charm, Alexis busies herself with the straw in her drink. “I knew it was you. I knew you picked out all the gifts. Mom and Dad didn’t even know I liked blue.” 

David nods quickly. Patrick tries to decide if the shine in his eyes is a trick of the light. “And you still returned that one dress, when you were fifteen.” 

“It was the wrong size, David!” Alexis is back on solid ground, it looks like. “What was I supposed to do, wear it as a maxi?” 

Apparently David doesn’t have anything else to say. Patrick thinks that might be a first. 

“It was cute, though,” Alexis says quietly. “Nice.”

***

“Can you find another place to do your dramatic pots and pans thing? I’m trying to study.”

“I am making you dinner, thanks so much.” David bangs the pots and pans louder. 

Stevie throws a pillow from the couch at him, but it misses. 

“Nice aim.”

“You’re going to critique _my_ athletic skills?” Stevie asks. She tucks the pen she’s been writing with behind her ear and crosses her arms. “Is that really a path you want to go down?”

David shakes his head. “I’ve seen the error of my ways.”

Stevie shifts, getting comfortable on their couch. An impossible feat, as it turns out, but she’s always been stubborn like that. “I don’t actually think I’ll have time for dinner. I have a stats test in a few days that I think might just murder me.”

“Stats test.” David slides the diced-up onion into the pot. “The horror.”

“Sales projections,” Stevie says, clicking her pen. “Sampling distributions.”

David stops stirring; he’s pretty sure the onions won’t burn. He tilts his head at Stevie.

She looks back up from her textbook. “What?”

“Nothing.” David doesn’t smile; it might spook her. “It’s just, you sound like a real businesswoman.”

“Shut up.” Stevie ducks her head and tucks her hair behind her ear.

***

“I can’t believe you got up this morning just for me.” Patrick says it like a joke. But honestly, David worked until three the night before. Patrick’s more than a little surprised that he’s letting himself be seen before noon.

“Just for you is a bit of a stretch. I happen to like the coffee here. It’s at least sixty percent for that.” David’s eyes are still bleary. Patrick would never say it, but there are bags under David’s eyes that speak to his late night. He’s dressed in an oversized grey sweater that Patrick wants to bundle into. He’s pretty sure both of them would fit. 

Patrick drums his fingers against their table. 

“Distraction or practice?” David asks.

“What?”

“Do you want me to distract you from your interview, or do you want to practice answering questions?” David’s looking at him patiently. 

Patrick knows with bone-deep certainty that he could pick either option and David would throw himself into it wholeheartedly. His fingers still.

“Distraction, please.” He wraps his hands around his tea. 

“Have I told you about the time Stevie convinced a tourist that a bench at the Art Gallery was part of the collection?” A corner of David’s mouth tugs up. Patrick likes this smile most of all, he thinks. It means that he and David are both in on the joke.

“What you have to understand first is how tragically hungover the two of us were.” 

And David’s off, hands sketching the contours of the room, the bench, Stevie’s false righteousness. When he reaches the end of the story, when the tourist took out their camera to take a picture and Stevie pointed to the “no pictures” sign behind them, Patrick’s laughing so hard he’s crying.

David’s laughing too, then he takes in an odd inhale and snorts. He keeps giggling, like he can’t help it, but the tips of his ears are red. He takes a sip of his coffee.

Patrick wants to tell him not to worry, that the snort is actually really cute. And then maybe—wait. The snort is cute. David’s snort is cute. It’s too chicken-or-egg to decide if the snort makes David cute or David makes the snort cute. Cute doesn’t sound like a real word anymore, even in his head. 

He grabs for his tea, to give his hands something to hold onto so he doesn’t float away. 

“So,” David says. Patrick comes back to reality, where they’re sitting in a tiny cafe, all dark wood and the smell of espresso, and David’s eyeing the pastry case. “Pre-interview snack? Breakfast?”

Patrick gives David cover to get whatever he wants. “I’d take a banana nut muffin.”

David shakes his head. “Wrong answer.”

He’s impossible. Patrick wants David to tell him everything wrong with his muffin choice. He’d listen. But he’s still Patrick, which means he has to be contrary or he’ll die. “Final answer.”

“Only because I can’t shake your confidence before an interview.” David stands and moves to the counter. 

Patrick watches him go, and can only think _cute_. And then David turns and smiles at him when he catches Patrick looking, and Patrick can’t think anything at all.

He shakes his head. Interview. He’s going to get through this interview, with this licensing group. He’s qualified and he has the preferred experience. And he’s a good interviewer.

He looks up and sees David, a plate in each hand. He got himself a slice of coffee cake; apparently his sugary coffee wasn’t enough to satisfy his sweet tooth.

He can’t wait until this interview is over. He has some other things he needs to think about.

When he leaves the interview, two hours later, he wants to text David his good news. He stops himself, though. He texts his mom first and accepts her congratulations. Then he texts David and accepts his offer of a celebratory drink. From a boy he thinks is cute. 

The next day at Ted and Alexis’s, Patrick doesn’t examine the way he gravitates toward David. He focuses on the game instead. Or he tries to.

“Okay, put down the train cards and grab a name.” Stevie’s shaking one of Patrick’s baseball caps. 

Patrick wants to scream. It’s already impossible to get these people to take Ticket to Ride seriously. They don’t need any other distractions. “Yes, Stevie, it’s fine with me if you use my hat. Thanks for asking.”

But this group is full of short attention spans, and they’ve already abandoned the game for whatever Stevie is doing.

Stevie holds up her free hand. “Don’t look at me. Alexis grabbed it.”

Alexis is sorting all of her routes into two piles. She’s such a hoarder; she keeps drawing routes even though she has maybe ten trains on the board. “What, was I supposed to use one of my hats? I don’t want all of your hands in there. What if I get lice? Plus, David works in a bar. No offense, David.”

David scoffs and carefully stands. He keeps an eye on his trains, which are organized in three meticulous lines. “That’s not how you get lice.” He frowns and looks at Ted. “Right?”

Ted nods. “Right. And I’ve got shampoo you could use if you did get lice.”

Alexis cringes from her soul. “ _Ew_ , Ted.”

“Ground rules,” David says. “No trading. We stick to the limit.” 

Everyone looks at Alexis, who nods. “No trading.”

Ted clears his throat.

“Ugh, fine. We stick to the limit.” 

“And we keep who we have a secret this time.” David’s looking at Ted. Patrick thinks his suspicion is well-founded.

Stevie taps her foot. “Who wants to draw first?” David reaches a hand into the hat. He grabs a piece of paper, checks it quickly, and puts it in his pocket. 

Alexis goes next, then Ted. 

Patrick waves a hand at Stevie. “Ladies first.”

Patrick grabs the last piece of paper. His breath hitches when he sees handwriting he recognizes from receipts and the menu boards in the bar. 

Fuck.

How is he supposed to get a gift for David? One that shows David how taken he is with him, how taken he is with who he is when he’s with David. He wants this gift to maybe tell David everything. Maybe it would be easier than trying to find the words. But the limit is thirty-five dollars. That’s not going to be enough to say all that he wants to say. 

He folds the paper so that Alexis can’t read it from where she’s trying to look over her shoulder. “Something I can help you with, Alexis?” 

“Of course not, Patrick.” She puts her hand on his arm. “Unless you want to tell whoever has me,” she pitches her voice louder, “that David has all my sizing and fabric and stone preferences.”

“Oh, _deer_ ,” Ted says. “I don’t think you’re quite in the holiday spirit yet, babe.”

David sits back down at the table next to Patrick. He grabs a blue train and draws one from the pile. “Want to trade?” David asks. 

“David.” Patrick laughs. “You’re the one who came up with the no trades rule.”

“Fine, be a buzzkill.” 

But David’s smiling at him. At least, he is until Patrick cuts off one of his routes. Then he’s doing the opposite of smiling, for a value of opposite that means cursing Patrick out. 

***

David flexes his fingers. Nothing’s gone right today. 

At least Patrick is here. He asked for a new drink tonight. Told David to surprise him, like David could do anything with that but let his mind spin up all kinds of ridiculous come-ons and innuendo. 

“This is good,” he says, setting the glass back down on the bar. On a napkin. David really likes Patrick. 

“A new old standby?”

Patrick shakes his head decisively. “I like my drink better.”

“Is this drink not also your drink?”

“You know what I mean.”

David does. 

“What’s going on in your head?” Patrick asks, but not like he’s upset. Like he’s interested.

David shakes said head; it’s so stupid. “It’s so stupid.”

“I highly doubt that.” Patrick runs a finger along the rim of his glass. “What ever happened to spilling all your problems to your bar patron?”

David suppresses a shiver. Patrick’s always listening to him; it would be terrifying if it didn’t feel so good.

“My mom called a couple days ago.” 

Patrick nods. He’s actually going to listen, David thinks. 

Maybe it’s also terrifying.

“I hadn’t talked to her for,” David picks up a glass and wipes at a spot. “A while.”

“How is she?”

“We didn’t get that far.” David sighs. This, whatever it is, is exhausting. “She hung up on me.”

Patrick’s eyes widen. “That’s hard.”

“I expected it.” David waves a hand. “I was going to hang up on her first, but I didn’t.”

There’s something playing at Patrick’s mouth. David looks, but he’s pretty sure it’s not disgust.

“We aren’t really speaking right now. I kind of burned the bridge.” David pauses. Breathes. “I definitely burned that bridge. Salted the earth. Insert dramatic metaphor.”

Patrick chuckles and sips his drink.

“My...ex? Actually let me know that my parents were bankrolling the gallery I was working at. I thought I was doing it solo, apart from their seed money, which I already felt weird about. But he said they were buying all of the art I thought I was selling.”

“How did he know?”

“Apparently it was an open secret.” David’s hands are shaking. He hides them behind the bar. “To people who weren’t me.”

He blinks. He will not be crying in a bar, thank you very much, his twenties are _nearly_ in his rearview.

“David.” Patrick says his name in a way that David does not have the bandwidth to deal with.

“And Sebastien—the ex, that was his name—said that’s why he took me out the first time. To harness the multitude of opportunities we could represent.” David is still talking. Why is he still talking?

“And your mom called to apologize?” Patrick asks. His eyes are flat, like he’s mad. Like he’s mad _for_ David. 

David laughs. It doesn’t come out as a sob, and he thanks his lucky stars. “No. It’s almost time for their holiday party.”

“I see.” Patrick downs the rest of his drink. Probably an excuse to get out of here. David’s such a downer. But then. “I’d like my drink, when you get a chance, please.”

David wants to thank Patrick, or cry into his shoulder, or something. Instead, he grabs Patrick’s empty glass. “Which drink would that be?” He asks. “Because you’ve had a few—”

“David.” Patrick’s smiling. “ _My_ drink. Please.”

Thankful he has something to do with his hands, David grabs for the sake and bourbon. 

“Did I ever tell you about how Ted and I started out as roommates?” Patrick asks.

David grabs at the topic with both hands. “How many puns in the first week?”

After Patrick finishes _his_ drink, and of course David knows what that means, he pats David’s hand. Not for the first time, David is thankful Wendy agreed to the dim lighting he suggested. 

“Want to get lunch Wednesday?” David hears. But Patrick’s mouth isn’t moving, so it must’ve come from him. He puts his hand on Patrick’s arm. If he’s doing this, he’s going to do it right. “We can’t have your drink, but I’m sure we could find somewhere to eat where we can see each other’s faces.”

Patrick bites his lip. “I’d love that.” 

David manfully does not grin or pump his fist in victory. “Perfect,” he says. “I can text you a place?”

Patrick nods and stands. “Thanks, David.” 

He reaches into his pocket to grab his wallet, but David flicks a hand at him. 

“On the house,” he says. “Sorry you had to put up with—" _Me_ , he doesn’t say. "All of that.” 

Patrick shakes his head so fast that David’s actually worried his ears will pop. “That’s not necessary.”

“It’s fine,” David says. He needs to do this. He can’t let Patrick lose out on too much tonight. Not if he wants him to actually show up—for their _date_ —on Wednesday.

Patrick puts some bills on the counter. “I want to,” he insists. David doesn’t hear _want_ like that very often. Like he means it. 

“Fine,” David says. “I only give you free drinks when you bare your soul.” 

Patrick looks down, then back up, and meets David’s eyes. “Deal. See you Wednesday.”

***

As if summoned by his conversation with David about parents, Patrick’s dad calls him the next morning.

“Hey, Dad.” Patrick’s treading carefully. His mom has gone on these fishing expeditions with him every week since he left, but this is the first time his dad has called. 

“Patrick.” It’s loud where his dad is. Probably the grocery store. It makes it harder to read his tone. “How’s it going on your end?”

Patrick puts his hand over his mouth. Only child that he is, Patrick had cried for the better part of an afternoon when he realized that no one would be on the other end of the walkie-talkies he got for his sixth birthday. For the entirety of the next week, and on and off until the things finally died, Patrick’s dad answered his missives religiously. Patrick recites his next lines. “All’s well here.”

“Glad to hear it, kid.” His dad pauses. “I miss you.”

“Me too.” And he does. “I still need to be here, but. I miss you too.”

Patrick’s dad is quiet. He can hear the beeps and chatter that mean he’s in the check-out line. 

Patrick doesn’t know how much more he can take of the beeps. “Calling from the store?”

“Always.”

That’s true. He always does. “Need to go?”

“Probably should.” He thinks his dad is reluctant, but it’s still loud on his end. “Next time, I’ll call outside the checkout line. Love you, kid.”

“Love you.”

Patrick hangs up, and then he puts his head in his hands. Just for a minute.

***

“Can we get lunch tomorrow?” 

David rolls his eyes. “You really need to find something to do while Ted’s at work.”

“That is so unfair, David.” Alexis is filing her nails—probably getting her cells all over his counter, ew, why did she even bring a nail file to his apartment—and doesn’t even look at him as she keeps talking. “Besides, sometimes I go to work with Ted. Or have lunch with Patrick or you. And I’m still spokesmodeling for that cuticle cream.” 

Because he can sometimes be a good person, David elects to not tell Alexis that one sponsored post does not a spokesmodel make. 

“I can’t tomorrow,” David says. He sets a bowl in front of Alexis and turns to find her a spoon.

She descends on the soup like she hasn’t eaten in days. He knows that it’s good. He’s had it going in the slow cooker all day, and Stevie swore up and down that she did not light up when she saw it, but David knows what he saw. But he doesn’t think it’s that good.

“Maybe we can get dinner tomorrow,” David offers. 

“Do you have plans for lunch?” Alexis might as well be asking if a fish is walking, she’s so surprised. It’s a little hurtful. David sometimes has plans.

“That is correct.” _Stop asking, stop asking, stop asking._

“And I can’t come?”

“It’s just going to be the two of us, I think.” David knows he’s opened himself up to follow-ups; Alexis has been trying to trick, shame, and coerce him back into dating for months. 

“Oh,” Alexis says in a way that spells trouble. “It’s a date, then.”

“Mm.” 

“What’s their name? Did you meet them at the bar? Of course you did,” Alexis answers her own question, “because where else do you ever go other than my apartment and the bar.”

“I resent that.” David thinks. “I also go to the grocery store and the movie theater.”

Alexis waits.

“I met them at the bar.”

Alexis wiggles. “You can tell me all about your date over dinner.”

“Let’s go back to what you do when Ted’s not around.” _Please_. 

“You’re such a mother hen. I hang out with Patrick, sometimes. He’s got that job now, though. I go running.”

“What do you want to do?” David’s treading water in this conversation, but just barely. 

“What do you mean?” Alexis frowns. “I like running.”

“No, I mean, what do you want to do?” David doesn’t know how to make Alexis understand him. It’s a theme for them, or something. 

“I don’t mind what I’m doing.”

“But do you want to be doing it?” David’s beating his head against a brick wall. Metaphorically.

“Does anyone ever want to work? I thought the whole goal was, like, to retire and relax. I’m already relaxed.” Alexis gestures with her spoon. Perched in one of the chairs at David’s counter, wearing yoga pants and a full face of makeup, Alexis does, in fact, look very relaxed.

"No, really," David says. "There's this bakery, like a block from your place?" 

And Alexis nods and widens her eyes. "I go there sometimes. They do really good muffins." 

David bites back the lifeline, where he could tell Alexis that the only good part of a muffin is the top and they can keep floating above it all, all of the genuine human emotion that still gets clogged in David's throat sometimes. That he still can't talk about without wanting to run away. He's pretty sure he'd come back. 

"Anyway, there's a woman there. She owns the place, I guess? And she and her team do all of the baking. She came up with almost all of the recipes. And she talks to me for like, five minutes every time I go in. She's really nice." 

Alexis looks confused. David can relate. He felt that way at first, too. 

"She talks a lot about how she wants to open a second location, but she doesn't know when it will happen." 

"Why is she telling you all of that?" Alexis asks. There's something like horror in her voice. David felt the same horror when Marie first started talking to him. She just told him about her wants and her skills and what she felt, like it was easy. Like it didn't leave her vulnerable, and like no soft spots were exposed when she did it. 

"She just tells people," David says. He feels ridiculous. It's not like it's a secret. But for him and Alexis, that kind of thing had always been a secret. If people knew what you wanted or what you thought you were good at, they could use that. To hurt, to belittle, to mock. 

"That's..." 

David takes pity on Alexis. "Right?" He says. "But it's true. She just wants it and is working for it." 

"What happens if she doesn't get it?" Alexis asks, all in a rush, like she can't believe she's letting herself ask the question. 

David shrugs. "Then she'll keep trying, I guess."

***

“If my mom doesn’t stop calling me, I’m going to block her number.”

Patrick turns from his spot on his bed to look at Alexis. They’re looking at the registration packet for the business school she’s enrolled in. She keeps circling classes like marketing and, inexplicably, cosmology, but Patrick thinks she’s reluctantly willing to take statistics and economics. He hopes so, at least; they’re required. He promised to buy her lunch if she registers for finance. 

“Why is she calling?”

Alexis groans, a long, drawn-out thing. “Anything and everything. Honestly, Patrick, she’s driving me up a wall. I think she used to call David this much, too. I can’t imagine how many more hours he has in his day now. Like, two, at least.”

Patrick bites his lip. These breadcrumbs he gets about David can break his heart or light it up from the inside. But it’s always a gamble.

“Were the two of you close when you were kids? Like you are now?”

“Ew,” Alexis says, from her soul. “We are _not_ close now.”

Patrick debates arguing the point, but she and David really are cut from the same cloth. 

"I actually wasn't. Nice. To David, before." 

“I'm sure that's not true.” Alexis probably poked and prodded at David, just like she does now, but that’s good for him. He takes himself too seriously if left unchecked.

“No,” Alexis says. She puts down her highlighter. “We had this movie room in our house. And David was driving me up the wall once. Always wanting to spend time together, and asking how I was.”

“That must have been so hard for you.”

Alexis shoots him a look. Patrick shuts up.

“Anyway, I wanted him to leave me alone. So I left this note in my bed, about how annoying he was, and how I wasn’t coming back. And then I went and hid in the movie room for five days.”

Patrick’s first thought is that someone should have been watching Alexis more closely if she was able to hide for nearly a week. His second thought is of tiny David and Alexis trying to out-stubborn each other. 

“It wasn’t that bad for me, actually.” Alexis isn’t looking at him anymore. “I told the chefs where I was, so they sent down food. I kind of thought our parents would, like, check in, and I could go back upstairs and pretend I was still mad. But by the third day I found out my mom was doing reshoots and my dad was scoping out a new retail location.”

“And then what happened?” This is definitely one of the stories that breaks his heart.

“I went back upstairs and told David I made too much popcorn and needed him to help me eat it. I even let him ruin his half with his gross toppings.”

“That was nice of you.”

Alexis rolls her eyes. “Nothing about what I did that week was nice.”

“You could, maybe,” Patrick doesn’t know what he’s allowed to say here. “Maybe tell him you’re still thinking about it.”

“There’s no way he still thinks about it.” Alexis shakes her shoulders, like she’s shrugging the emotions away.

“You’re still thinking about it, though.”

Alexis nods.

***

David smiles when he sees Patrick heading toward their table. He got one of the high-tops near the bar. He feels like it’s the right place for them. Maybe the bar can be their good luck charm. And then he sees Alexis, a few steps behind the guy David finally got up the nerve to ask out yesterday. The guy who must have invited Alexis himself, because David didn’t tell Alexis where he was going. 

David tries to parse the words of Patrick’s greeting over the screaming inside his head. 

Alexis is looking at him with— _ew_ —something like pity, except David doesn’t think she’s ever felt pity except for that one time she told Elijah Wood she wasn’t interested and he didn’t take it well. 

David can’t let that stand. “Hi,” he says, voice too high. Alexis will sense that; it’s blood in the water.

Patrick’s rubbing a hand across the back of his neck, which is not helping David rein in his attraction. “Sorry, I should have told you ahead of time. But Alexis was free and I thought we could all hang out.” 

If he wanted a sign, if he wanted definitive proof of Patrick’s feelings, he has it. He wishes the message was different, even though he’s relieved to be sure.

But he can work with this. “Alexis, I thought you would be buried in textbooks by now.”

“Classes just started last week, David,” Alexis huffs. “And they’re mostly online, so I’ve been focusing on making friends.”

“Networking,” Patrick corrects. He’s smiling the same way he always does; for him, it seems like nothing has changed. 

David can’t indulge that fantasy. Of course Patrick knew this was a date. And this is his answer. That’s fine, of course, David reminds himself. He can absolutely work with this. 

He needs to make it clear he’s gotten the message. “So Patrick,” he says, resting his chin on his hands, “are you going to tell us who you have for the gift exchange, or are you going to be a huge bummer?”

Alexis makes a noise she’d be horrified to hear David call a squeal. “If it’s me, I can just send you my wishlist now. Save you some time.”

And that’s almost enough to make David forget why she’s here, or that her being here means that Patrick is officially and unequivocally not interested. But then, ten minutes later, after they’ve discussed the gifts David and Alexis gave and received in last year’s exchange—Stevie gave David the biggest chocolate bar that the grocery store had and four thrifted paperbacks, and David wanted to cry because he’d never felt so seen but had restrained himself—Alexis texts him. 

**are u on a date**

**DAVID is this a date**

**i thought you knew better then inviting your sister on a date**

**this is not an affective dating strategy**

And David keeps his face neutral and keeps nodding along to Patrick’s story as he replies.

**I didn’t invite you Patrick did**

Then he puts his phone in his pocket. He feels it vibrate again, and Alexis is looking at him meaningfully. He turns his attention back to Patrick. Not a hardship, honestly.

Alexis clears her throat while Patrick talks about his mom and basketball, or baseball, or something. David’s trying his hardest, but sports all run together for him.

“Do you need some water, Alexis?” David asks pointedly. He needs her to stop.

“You’re so sweet, David.” Alexis is glaring at him. He hasn’t been on the receiving end of that glare since the time their mom called Alexis in a tizzy about a sweet but misguided fan who told Moira that she was aging gracefully. 

Sensing that Alexis won’t stop without direct action, David aims a kick at her foot. Patrick jumps when the kick lands. _Oops._ The back of David’s neck heats up. 

“Sorry,” he says. “I thought I was hitting the table leg.” 

“This is a booth, David.” But Patrick picks his story up where he left off. Now they’re at a cabin? 

David shakes his head to clear it and tries to listen. He toys with the idea of making an excuse and going to the bathroom. Not to climb out the window, though he’s done that before, too. He just thinks it might be nice to collect himself. To take a beat and take in all of the ways he was wrong about this. But he reminds himself that this is far from the worst way he’s been rejected. 

Patrick throws his head back and laughs at his own story. 

This doesn’t even make the top ten worst first dates David’s ever been on, he thinks. Might as well power through it. And if he wasn’t here, it would just be Alexis and Patrick, which would be so much worse. He doesn’t trust his sister not to do something objectively sweet but misguided, like telling Patrick that he thought this was a date. He’d rather run over his own foot with a scooter. One of the heavy electric ones. 

Alexis is telling a story now, about the time she was stuck on that yacht in international waters until he could charter a boat to come get her. Patrick’s looking at her, smile polite but eyes lost. 

It does sting the smallest bit more than some of his other first dates, though, David admits, just to himself. He...respects Patrick. It’s possible that he could have developed genuine feelings for him. He’s nice. And, of course, there’s the Alexis of it all. 

Still. David puts on a smile and joins in with a story about that time Alexis told him she was in the Rocky Mountains so David showed up to get her, but then he couldn’t find her and she had actually meant she was just in _some_ rocky mountains. The Swiss Alps, to be exact. Patrick joins in on teasing Alexis, and she rolls her eyes at them both. He can feel his smile becoming more real as the food comes, and then as they eat the food, and then as Alexis begs him to split a dessert and ends up eating it all herself.

This is okay, he thinks. It's okay to have this instead. Better than okay, even. It's not _less_ to have a really good friend. He could do with more real friends, even if just Stevie alone is more than he ever thought he deserved. This all could have gone so much worse.

When lunch is over, after they’ve split the bill three ways, like friends, and Patrick said that he had to get back so he can prepare for the work presentation he somehow already has next week, Alexis pokes David in the side.

He makes a noise of protest, but accepts his fate. He deserves to be teased. He was so stupid. 

“David.”

“I will not be taking questions.”

“David.”

“Comments either. I’d like to avoid comments.”

“David.” She’s smiling, probably because David hasn’t done anything this clueless in a while. “Patrick would be very cute for you. I like this.”

David’s pretty sure they’re still in a world where two plus two equals four. Alexis isn’t making any sense. 

"I don't know if we were just at the same place. Where I was, the guy I think is nice and cute just invited my sister along on what I thought was our first date.” The words are sticky in David’s throat. A problem for another time. “But tell me more about your thing. It sounds like it went way better for me."

Alexis pokes his side again, even though she knows he hates that. "Ugh. David, Patrick's so new to this. You can't hold this against him!"

David wants to die. He would rather die than tell Alexis exactly how clear Patrick had been. “Alexis. I asked him if he was free to grab some food. I referenced an inside joke and put my hand on his arm. What is that if not an invitation for a date?”

It’s straight from the playbook he’s always used. 

Alexis looks like she did when she was seven years old and David cut her mini marshmallow supply off after she ate nothing but that for three days straight. He’s surprised she doesn’t stamp her foot. “You’re overreacting,” she says, tone petulant. He half expects her to say that marshmallows are surprisingly nutritious. What she does say is almost worse. “You didn’t actually say it was a date. Poor thing has been out of the game for like, a decade. Cut him some slack.”

“Alexis.” David hears a note of something in his voice that’s terrifying. It’s needy. Whiny. Desperate in a way he doesn’t think he really is. Anymore. “Can we please be done with this?”

Whatever that something is, it gets the job done. Alexis huffs, and stomps when she walks toward the door. At least she’s going. And she’s not talking about it anymore. 

It clearly wasn't a date. Or at least Patrick was pretty kind about not wanting it to be a date by inviting Alexis, and not, like, leaving him alone in a performance art piece that's horrifyingly interactive, as a totally random example off the top of his head. 

But, David thinks, even as he's consoling himself on the walk home by imagining all the ways it could have been way more horrible, it would have been pretty nice if Patrick did feel the same. If it was just the two of them. It could've been worse; it could have been so much worse. It also could have been better.


	3. tree-fill

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Megan](https://stuck-on-your-heart.tumblr.com/) came up with the best joke in this whole chapter and all of the other best parts, I'm pretty sure!

“Are you going to watch _Golden Girls_ with me or agonize over birthday gifts all night?”

David scoffs. “Who’s to say that I can’t do both?” 

Patrick’s birthday is fast approaching, and the man is impossible to shop for. David used to think that people who were hard to shop for were an urban legend. With enough money, it was easy to find any gift for any person. 

It’s a little different now.

Not only are his means much more limited, but he’s also trying to find a gift that says both “happy birthday, friend, I love that we’re friends,” and “I’m not implying that I like you, I’m happy that we’re just friends.” 

A gym bag is probably safe, as long as he avoids any mention of how ratty Patrick’s old bag is. And also avoids mentioning the way Patrick’s shoulders looked in his gym clothes that time he and Patrick watched a movie at his apartment after Patrick boxed with Ted. 

But he wants to get these tickets, too. Even if spending so long on this comedy club’s website makes him taste bile. Given his history with that one ex-boyfriend who brought him to the club, name-dropped him within the first minute of his set, and then systematically made fun of his clothes, family, and job for the rest of his five minutes—not to mention his general disdain for live comedy—it’s a tricky situation to navigate. Patrick’s laugh still echoes in his head, though. He showed David a three-minute video of this comedian last week and laughed on and off all night. David wants to hear that again. It’s worth putting up with the terrible design of this website for as long as he needs to.

“You’re going to get a frown line if you overthink any harder.” Stevie’s head lolls against the back of the couch. 

That’s the last straw. He clicks _purchase_ and closes the laptop. It’ll have to do.

He crosses the room to the couch. He and Stevie start out laying against the cushions but mostly end up leaning on each other. 

“What’d you get?” Stevie asks as the theme starts playing.

“If I tell you, you’ll just wind me up about whether it was the right decision.”

“Try me.”

But David shakes his head. “Can’t risk that frown line.”

“You know he’d like anything you gave him.” 

“It’s not as easy.” David clears his throat. “It’s not as easy with other people as it is with you.” He hates this busted-open feeling, but Stevie doesn’t let him stew for long.

Stevie snorts. "That's the stupidest thing you've ever said, and it's a very high bar. It's almost impressive." 

David makes a noise of protest, but one that he thinks Stevie will just talk over. He's not disappointed. 

"David," Stevie says, turning her head where it's pillowed against the back of his knee, "nothing about living with you is easy." 

David squirms, uncomfortable, but Stevie pokes his hip to silence him. 

"Nothing about you is easy," she says, looking into his marrow, or something. Her eyes get scary like that sometimes. "But I still want to live with you. I'll keep you around." 

And David wiggles and turns up the volume. They missed Rose's whole storyline. They'll have to start the episode over.

***

“Well, it’s getting a little late. I think everyone’s pretty tired.”

“Absolutely not.” Alexis crosses her arms. “This is the first time I’ve been ahead when we all play Monopoly. And I’m not even a little bit tired. Stevie, are you tired?”

Stevie shakes her head. “And what was it you said when you were winning and we all wanted to quit last week, Ted? That quitting before Monopoly is over is like making dinner and not eating it?”

Ted shakes his head. “I don’t think I said that.”

David nods. “Yes, you did. You told us all that we were babies who needed to take a _Chance_.”

“And it’s kind of funny,” Patrick pipes up, “that you’re tired. I could have sworn that I saw you napping on the couch earlier. Such a coincidence that the moment you’ve decided you’re tired is after you rolled a six, which would have put you right on Alexis’s railroad.”

“Fine.” Ted sits back down and crosses his arms. “But I’m not trading with you under the table anymore, David.”

David holds up his hands. “You’re the one who wanted the electric company.”

When Patrick and Ted are putting the game away—even though Alexis won, because apparently “winner puts it away” only goes so far—Ted sighs. 

“She doesn’t play logically. I have no idea why she does what she does. I thought she had a strategy once, but then she changed it all up the next time.”

Patrick puts a hand on his shoulder bracingly. “David once circled an entire tile in Catan with roads because he thought it would look nice,” he says. “And then he won.”

Ted nods. “They’re impossible. Was it sheep, or something?” 

Patrick puts his head in his hands. “It was the desert. I still don’t know how that happened.”

***

“David, this is so nice.” 

“I’m glad you like it. And I hope you can find someone to go to the show with on short notice, too. I was going to give the tickets to you earlier, but—” 

Patrick tilts his head. “Wait, do you not want to come?”

“What do you mean?” David asks.

“I just assumed you would come. I thought you might—will you come with me?”

David’s going to say no, or at least lay out a list of no fewer than ten ground rules—out of spotlight range, Patrick has to get up and get the drinks so David doesn’t interact with employees, and no social media posts until they leave, to name a few—but instead, he nods.

“Good,” Patrick says. He’s smiling, which is more than David had hoped for when he was flirting with frown lines over gift ideas. 

As for himself, David is torn between a smile and a grimace. Patrick wants to go with him, which is great. But Patrick wants to go with him to a _comedy show_ in a club that David swore to never again frequent. 

But Patrick will be there. So of course David will go.

***

“Happy birthday, honey.”

“Thanks, mom.” Patrick’s not good at receiving well wishes. He never knows what to say. “I’m glad you called.”

“I miss you. _We_ miss you.”

“I miss you too.” Patrick shifts from one foot to the other. “I’m seeing stand-up tonight,” he offers. 

“Patrick,” His mom says. 

He breathes out. She’s using the same voice she used to tell him he had to get home when he missed curfew, or when he burned the pasta while they made spaghetti. She has a very tender way of telling him he’s messing up. 

Patrick feels every mile between the house where his mom taught him to knead dough and Toronto. They feel insurmountable. _But_ , a small voice in the back of his head says, _so did cooking pasta before your mom helped you._

“Mom,” Patrick says. “I do miss you. I want to celebrate with you sometime soon.”

“I’ll make those awful cupcakes you like, even.” His mom laughs. It sounds suspiciously wet.

“German chocolate is the best flavor.” Patrick grabs onto the safe topic with both hands. “I won’t have this debate again.”

“Have a good day,” his mom says. “Find a gross cupcake, even, if you can.”

Patrick says his goodbyes. He’s meeting David in a few hours, and he needs to change. 

***

“Did you want to get any closer to the stage?”

“Mm mm. Nope. I am perfectly happy here.” David pauses. “What about you? Do you, um. Do you want to be closer?”

David picked this spot specifically because the spotlight couldn’t reach them and his back was to most of the room, but he doesn’t want to tuck Patrick into a corner on his birthday. 

“No, I’m fine.” Patrick’s smiling at him. 

David wishes he would stop doing that. 

“I’m going to get a drink,” Patrick continues. “Do you want something?” 

“Water.” David rubs his fingers against the denim of his jeans. He wore one of his best outfits tonight, just in case. He can’t imagine explaining the way he’s wearing this outfit like armor to Patrick. But it’s still true. 

When Patrick gets up, David takes the opportunity to scan faces. If his ex is here, he’ll pull a fire alarm or fake a swoon and he won’t feel guilty for even a millisecond. 

Okay, he’ll feel guilty for _one_ millisecond. It’s Patrick’s birthday, after all.

Then he thinks about how if Patrick actually wanted to date him, this would be their second date, and he wants to pull a fire alarm even though he can’t find that one smarmy meerkat face. 

He smiles when Patrick comes back even though his skin tugs like the smile hurts. 

“I ordered a vodka lemonade, but I think their rail stuff is just lighter fluid.” Patrick wrinkles his nose.

David motions for the glass and takes a whiff, then bares his teeth. “Yeah, that’s radioactive. I can go get beer? Or wine?”

Patrick shakes his head. “I can do it. Anything besides water?”

When the warmth of Patrick’s regard is wrapped around him, here in this dark corner where the spotlight can’t reach, David doesn’t know what he’s so worried about. “Wine. Please.”

“Should I run screaming if it comes from a box?”

“Common misconception,” David says and waves a hand. “It’s fine unless they ask you to slap the bag. Then do please run screaming. Or maybe call a health inspector.”

“Noted.” Patrick’s laughing, but David feels like he’s in on the joke. He hopes that feeling lasts. 

***

“So you knew David when he worked at that gallery?”

Ted nods. He’s balanced precariously on a ladder hanging string lights over Alexis’s desk in Patrick’s room. The wire is fiddly and frustrating, but Ted’s still on an even keel. 

“Yep. You could say I have a pretty good _frame_ of reference.”

Patrick elects not to make the womp-womp sound and instead adjusts his grip on the base of the ladder. He senses that Ted will be less likely to answer his questions if he does. That one was also far from his worst pun of the day. It was even kind of funny.

“Was he always this good at naming drinks, or did he learn a lot on the job?” Patrick’s thinking about the Madonna thing and the names for nineties-themed drink specials that David spitballed yesterday. A few made Patrick crack up, and he knows his face scrunched up unattractively when he did.

“David has always had really good taste,” Ted says dutifully. “But between you and me, his mocktails got a lot better after those first few months. I had a lot of virgin piña coladas before he got his feet under him.”

That’s how Ted always refers to David now: he has his feet under him. 

“Were you guys friends even before he started working at The Inn?” Patrick asks. He wants to keep prodding, but strangely enough, Ted’s more sensitive to his fishing than Alexis is. 

“We definitely got closer when we started seeing each other more often.” Ted twines the string around a nail and motions for another one. “I’m pretty sure he laughed at my pun yesterday. Didn’t you think that was a laugh?”

“Definitely.” Patrick had stopped listening when the two of them started talking about Madonna. Again.

“He made me a new mocktail, too, and he even used wordplay to name it.” Ted hops off the ladder so that they can move it over a few feet. “Alexis gives him hell, but he's such a good guy.” 

“Is it okay that I put beer in the fridge?” Patrick asks. He doesn't want to make anything harder for Ted.

“Yeah, actually, can I have one? Alexis doesn’t drink it, so I didn’t keep it around before.” 

“Of course.” Patrick gives Ted a hand as he hops off the ladder. 

“What about his rings?” Patrick asks before he can stop himself, a few minutes later. Ted’s back from putting the ladder away, and Patrick opened a few of the bottles from the fridge in the meantime. 

“What about the rings?” Ted asks. He’s leaning forward against the counter. He complained earlier about how long he spent doing intakes on his feet today because the vets who own the practice won’t put in another desk for him. 

“Are they, like,” Patrick coughs. “Do you think he changes the placement intentionally? Like, is there a reason?” He takes another swig from his bottle and feels horribly exposed. 

Ted taps his finger against the lip of the bottle. “Like mood rings? Because I have to tell you, those aren’t really accurate.”

Patrick picks at the label. “No, I know. It’s silly.”

It seems like Ted’s going to say more for a second. But then it passes. Instead, Ted drums his knuckles against the counter before pushing himself up. 

“Want to watch a few episodes of Alexis’s show? I think she has it all on DVR.”

Patrick blinks. “She had a show?”

“Oh, this is going to be fun. Bring the rest of the six-pack. No one online had come up with a drinking game, so I _Rose_ to the occasion.”

“How often have you watched it?”

“Alexis referenced it so much when we started dating that I had to watch it to hold a decent conversation with her. We marathoned the whole thing like a month after we got together.”

Patrick puts his elbows on his knees as a horrible, wonderful theme song plays. He bites the inside of his cheek so hard that he’s surprised he doesn’t draw blood when Ted hums along. 

But by the third episode, Patrick’s humming too.

He’s glad for Ted’s company. Even though Alexis is charming and vivacious and disarming, some of the situations she finds herself in are. Oof. And he knew from David that that was the case, but still. It’s a lot. 

But he also wishes that Ted wasn’t there a few times. Patrick can’t rewind and replay that scene where he can hear David talking to what must be one of his parents on the phone for six whole seconds. But Ted’s watching, and he’s an easygoing guy, but Patrick knows that even Ted might pause.

Also, there are a lot of rules to this game. They get through the beer and switch to wine a few episodes in and giggle to each other about how it really does feel like the old days when they would mix alcohols in front of the television on a Friday. 

That’s where Alexis finds them when she comes home. Ted fell into Patrick ten minutes back when Smackers lip balm contacted Alexis about creating her own flavor, and Patrick can barely keep his eyes open. 

“Ew,” she says, taking in the younger version of herself huffing about artificial root beer flavor and the red wine staining Ted’s mouth and Patrick’s shirt. “What am I looking at?”

Patrick throws his arms in the air as Ted shoots up to a sitting position.

“That counts,” Ted says loudly. “She said it. You better drink, Brewer.”

Patrick does. And when Alexis grabs herself a glass, he pours the rest of the wine for her. 

When Moira appears on screen just to say something confusing about _Sunrise Bay_ , she groans and tips the glass back. 

Patrick laughs.

“What?” She asks. “I know the rules, too.”

***

Wendy’s new community punch bowl idea is actually one of her worst yet, because it’s so low-cost that David thinks he might not be able to talk her out of it. With the mechanical-bull-he-refuses-to-remember, at least he could throw around words like liability and damages and injuries and mechanic—okay, so saying mechanic to Wendy may have been a mistake, he forgot what Andre was doing when she met him—but the punch bowl is so cheap. He still says that it doesn’t make financial sense. No one is going to pay more than five dollars for a cup of punch. But Wendy’s never really been interested in the money side. Or the aesthetics side. Or the menu side.

David needs her to not be interested in the punch bowl. 

“Wendy, it’s going to be like a high school dance,” David says, enunciating each word clearly. 

Wendy nods. 

“And we don’t want that,” David adds. “Because if it’s like a high school dance then I’ll be thinking about braces and kids who don’t wear enough deodorant and people giggling at my sweaters.” 

Wendy nods again. 

“This is not a high school,” David says. He picks up the punch bowl, hating everything. 

“Can you see if we can get Kool Aid?” Wendy asks.

Luckily for Wendy, and for David’s continued employment, Patrick sinks into the seat that David’s starting to think of as his. 

“Patrick,” David says. There is no desperation in his voice. He hopes. “You wouldn’t buy a glass of punch from a communal bowl, would you?”

Before Patrick answers, he looks over at Wendy. David would lay money down that she’s nodding encouragingly at him. He checks over his shoulder and is disappointed to see that he’s right. 

“If it was really good punch,” Patrick says cautiously.

David throws his hands in the air. 

Great, excellent, and now Patrick is laughing at him. 

“I don’t even want to hear it if you want something other than your usual.” David grabs the sake and earl grey syrup. “You’ve lost my trust.”

“Patrick,” Wendy says, “have you ever tried my fancy margaritas?”

David nods enthusiastically to Patrick. “You have to try one. I can’t believe you haven’t yet.” He would normally feel bad about subjecting someone to a lemon pineapple margarita, because that’s too much citrus for anyone with functional taste buds, but it’s no more than Patrick deserves. A punch bowl. Honestly. Glee lights David up as Patrick watches Wendy make his drink. 

“That’s —” It seems like Patrick’s going to try to stop Wendy, but he changes his mind. “Is that lemon?”

“That’s what makes it fancy.” David winks at Patrick.

“I only make this for people I really like,” Wendy says.

“It’s a real honor,” David adds. 

David leans in as Wendy hands the glass to Patrick. 

He takes a dainty sip and gives Wendy a thumbs-up. “That’s really,” he puts the glass down, “wow.”

“What do you think of the flavor profile?” David can’t help himself. He’s probably a bad person for getting so much enjoyment out of this, but he was already pretty sure that he was one, so it’s no great loss. 

“Wow,” Patrick says again. 

Wendy nods and bounces off to do whatever it is Wendy does, and David hands Patrick a glass of water. 

“Another?” He asks.

Patrick’s snort sets David off too. 

“That tastes worse than I imagine Alexis’s Smackers flavor did.” Patrick wipes a tear from the corner of his eye. 

“You started watching the show.” It took longer than David expected. Once, he brought a date home for the weekend and Alexis played an episode as they walked through the door.

“I started watching the show.”

“How far did you get? Because I have to say, it really finds its voice by the fifth episode.”

Patrick nods seriously. “Agreed. Though the theme song is still stuck in my head, and I watched it probably two weeks ago.”

“That’s normal.”

David tears his attention from Patrick and waves when he sees Ronnie walk in. He flicks through the menu he only keeps in his mind, because old standbys are ninety percent of his job. Ronnie’s drink is one of his personal favorites. 

Ronnie waves back, then nods curtly at Patrick. She sits one stool away, which makes David roll his eyes. This rivalry is getting silly. 

“Brewer,” Ronnie says. “David.”

“Hi, Ronnie,” Patrick says, and then he stops talking. Because his newest strategy is not to talk so that she can’t make fun of him.

Privately, David thinks that it’s an amateur move. Ronnie will always find something to poke and prod at if she wants to.

“How’s the packing going?” David asks. “You move in, what, two weeks?”

Ronnie lets her forehead drop to the counter. David’s happy that he wiped it down so thoroughly after the last spill. 

“I’m here and not packing, aren’t I?” She asks. 

“That’s either resounding praise or a complaint, and I’m not sure which.”

“It’s not praise.” Ronnie’s voice is flat. 

Patrick breaks his silence. “Moving is the worst.”

Ronnie points at him. “Moving is the worst.”

Emboldened, Patrick keeps trying. “Can I buy you a drink? I’ve been there.”

David feels like he’s watching a tennis match.

“David, charge Brewer for my free drink.” 

“Can do.” David sets about making Ronnie a cocktail. He’s been making it for over a year now, so it’s practically muscle memory.

“What’s in your drink?” Patrick asks. Bless him, but he’s really trying.

“That information is probably above your pay grade. You’ll have to try it yourself.”

But David already let Patrick try Wendy’s nightmare drink tonight, so he’ll save the Frankenstein creation he serves Ronnie for another night. 

“Might want to finish your drink first,” he says, nodding toward Patrick’s still-full glass. 

“Before I forget, Ashima finally popped the question,” Ronnie says.

David bounces on the soles of his feet. “God, how long has it been for them? Five years? Did Priya say yes?”

“Of course.” Ronnie rolls her eyes. “Said it took them long enough.”

“Tell them to stop by,” David offers. “Celebration drinks on the house if they do.”

David takes pity on Patrick, who’s clearly lost. “Mutual friend. Works at the embassy with Ronnie.”

“Got it.” Patrick sits up a little straighter. “Did you also meet them through the embassy?”

“I used to go all the time for Alexis. Passports, hostage negotiations. Color contacts, a few times.”

“That girl put us both through hell.” A spark of something flares in Ronnie’s eyes. 

“She’s different now,” David says as the familiar rush of defensiveness wells up. He doesn’t know why that reflex hasn’t faded. It’s not like Alexis ever wants his help.

“But she still did it.” It’s not even Ronnie who says it. It’s Patrick. 

David doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do with that. So he doesn’t touch it. Instead, he changes the subject to moving logistics and lets Ronnie and Patrick talk through moving vans and shipping crates and rummage sales.

Ronnie eventually drags herself off of the stool and back to her air mattress and packing tape. 

Of course Patrick stays and watches David close up the bar. David chats to fill the silence and tells the story of the first time Alexis went missing for over forty-eight hours and he hyperventilated in the bathroom outside Ronnie’s office, entirely by accident.

All of the other seats are empty, and David should really lock up. Still, he lingers a minute longer to keep talking to Patrick. And keep hearing his laugh and seeing his eyes light up when he teases David. 

But they do eventually have to close. David says goodbye and turns off the light. Then he locks the door. 

And walks home alone.

***

“This is unacceptable.” 

Patrick watches David take down the neon sign that Wendy hung proudly in the window just before Patrick walked in. “I don’t know, I kind of like it. It made me stop and stare before I came in.” 

Part of the reason Patrick stopped was because of the fish on the sign. It’s especially strange because there’s no seafood on the menu except for the shrimp cocktail that David snuck him leftovers of after that one corporate party. 

“I’m going to have to ask you to refrain from making fun of me while I’m in distress.” David makes an imperious gesture, which is actually kind of impressive considering that he’s still holding a neon sign of a fish drinking a beer. 

“Oh, are you in distress?” 

“Mm. Yes.” David sets the sign down behind the bar. He moves cautiously, like the sign will bite him if he makes a wrong move. “Please respect my needs at this time.”

Objectively, David’s being annoying. Patrick should be annoyed. Instead, he’s endeared despite himself. It’s a new feeling to find everything about someone so gorgeous, even the parts that frustrate him. 

His mind wanders back to Rachel as David launches into a diatribe about the myriad ways it clashes with the carefully curated aesthetic of the bar. Rachel gets just as fired up as David, or at least she did when they were in college. When her dad threw a fit about her and Patrick moving in together, he stood back and watched her calmly tear his expectations to shreds. Her dad even helped them move a couch into their third-floor walk up a few months later. 

“How did you manage to get it to look like this here?” He asks. From the way David and Wendy talk around each other, it can’t have been an easy road to install these open shelves behind the bar or select these warm leather stools. 

“It was not easy,” David says. “A gradual process. One change at a time. Next, I want to repaint the walls.” 

“I don’t know,” Patrick says. “I kind of like the wallpaper. Makes me think of my grandparents’ house.”

“There’s a time and place for paisley, but this isn’t it,” David agrees.

David and Rachel are certainly different, too. That’s for sure. Aside from the obvious—David spends way longer on his skincare routine—Rachel fights mean. Patrick does too. They both go for the jugular in an argument. It made them dangerous to one another in a fight, because they both knew exactly where to find each other’s sore spots and press until they hurt. They had such an explosive fight on their seventh anniversary that it wasn’t enough for Patrick to just leave their apartment. He turned off his phone and left town for a long weekend. All weekend, he sat in his cousin’s guest house and tried not to hear the echo of Rachel’s voice saying that she wasn’t going to let Patrick drag her down into his indecision, that he could drown under it alone.

Patrick’s seen David squabble with his sister and Stevie dozens of times by now. He gets petty and pedantic, and he definitely gives as good as he gets, but Patrick hasn’t seen him get mean. He stops poking once he finds a bruise. 

“Well, I look forward to seeing the paint, once you make it happen.” Patrick clears his throat and tries to claw himself out of his head and back into the conversation with David.

David looks inordinately pleased. “Good.”

Teasing works better with David than it ever worked with Rachel, too. David smiles and gives as good as he gets. And Patrick can luxuriate in the fun of it all. Joking with someone he cares about when there’s no pressure or heat behind it can be fun. That’s the environment Patrick was raised in, and it’s where he’s most comfortable. He missed it before David. It feels right with him in a way Patrick hasn’t had before. 

David makes him feel right. 

***

“So I went back to that bakery, you know, by my place?”

"Oh?" David says, hoping that his ears have not yet started physically perking up at the mere mention of baked goods. "Have they put out their winter seasonal menu yet? Because last year, they had this peppermint—" 

"David," Alexis interrupts, raising her eyebrows and blinking at him in a way that seems complicated. "I went. To that bakery. The one that we talked about." 

"Yeah," David says slowly. "Oh! You went to the bakery. Okay. And?" 

"And," Alexis flips a lock of hair over her shoulder. "The fryer was broken. They didn't have any donuts." 

David winces. Not great for his metaphor. Or for the craving he's now nurturing. 

"But the owner was still really nice," Alexis hurries to add. "Even though things were bad. And I knew things were bad. She was, like. Really nice, still. She gave me a free cake pop." 

David holds out his hand imperiously. It’s the least he deserves, even if it’s not a donut.

"I ate the cake pop, already, David." 

David retracts his hand. 

Alexis pulls a brown paper bag out of her purse, though. "I got you a scone. They have orange zest in them. Maybe it'll help you remember the ingredients for my drink." 

"That's surprisingly nice of you." David peeks in the bag. There's a bite missing from the corner of the scone. Well, it was all seeming a bit too good to be true. At least now he knows it's real. 

"I owe you," Alexis says. "It's a very cute study spot. I read, like, three whole chapters there this afternoon." 

"So you're out of highlighters?" David asks.

***

“You are not what I was expecting.” Stevie raises an eyebrow at Patrick, but she does step aside and let him in. 

Patrick holds up the bottles of wine he brought with him like a peace offering, or maybe a tribute. 

“I’ll get the big glasses.” Stevie walks into the kitchen. She comes out with—yes, those are big glasses that she’s pouring the entirety of the first bottle into. The wine’s not great, but he thinks it’ll get the job done. They were the biggest bottles he could find at the store. 

Patrick knows he probably looks kind of wild around the eyes, but Stevie’s too nice to say anything. He shakes his head. He’s too easy a target, maybe.

Silence reigns. Apparently they don’t have much to say when David’s not right in front of them, reacting to their teasing and kind of egging them on, honestly. Stevie tilts her head back and downs her glass of wine.

“David bought fifty bananas once.”

Stevie’s his favorite, he thinks. He does something that’s slightly more dignified than a glug. “Tell me everything.”

And Stevie helps. 

As she explains the intricacies of the chore wheel she bought David as a joke but that he now follows religiously and gets pretty passive aggressive about, if she’s being honest, Patrick starts to think he might still be the same. 

Sure, there’s this new thing about himself that feels huge and all-encompassing and life-altering and earth-shattering. And, oh god, how will he tell people, does he have to tell people?

He pours half of the second bottle into his glass. Step one: figure out who to tell. 

The wine kind of calms him, but the thing that really focuses him is the story Stevie’s telling about when Wendy wanted to get a mechanical bull for the bar. How is he supposed to figure out who to tell? Step one, subpoint a: figure out how to figure out who to tell. 

Then Stevie grabs a bottle of vodka from the fridge. And he orders a pizza. Stevie still gives him shit for the pizza toppings he wants when they order, and she still sets her feet in his lap imperiously, and she still rests her head on his shoulder as the movie winds down. And he bites into his pizza dramatically to make her laugh, and flicks her foot so he can dodge her kick, and presses his cheek into the top of her head. 

After Stevie’s grabbed him a pair of David’s sweatpants that she’s pretty sure he won’t squawk about and given him a pillow from David’s bed, he closes his eyes where he’s reclined on their couch.

And the words kicking around inside his head still feel big and scary—they're caged and need to get out; they have to get out—but he feels like he might be able to say them without the ground crumbling under his feet. He's on steady ground here.

***

“Do you think you’ll still get tea? Or have we finally discovered something serious enough for you to order coffee?”

Patrick scoffed, then immediately winced. David knew that particular flavor of hangover well. Head itchy from not showering, eyes bleary and squinting, clothes wrinkled. He was pretty sure it didn’t look as cute when he did it. 

“I don’t know if it’s that dire,” Patrick muttered. “Oh, hey.”

Patrick bumped into him. Patrick bumped into him because David stopped walking. He’d been focusing on making gentle fun of Patrick, and not thinking about where his feet were taking them. The path David had been leading Patrick along was well-worn, but it was dusty.

“What’s that?” Patrick asks. His hair is sticking up at the back of his head. David wants to focus on that instead of the building across the street. But for once, maybe the first time ever, Patrick can’t hold his attention.

“It, um.” David swallows. “It used to be that gallery.”

He can tell he’s missed nonchalant by a mile, but there’s nothing for it now. It’s already out in the world, words falling onto the sidewalk in front of Patrick.

To his chagrin, Patrick picks a few up. “Oh,” he says. He sounds more present than he did before. “Your gallery?”

“My parents’ gallery,” David corrects. It’s an important distinction. The most important distinction, as it turns out. 

“We can go,” Patrick offers. “Or—you can. Talk. I’d listen.” He’s so earnest; David wants to scream and wail and beat his fists against the ground in a truly embarrassing display of how upset this place makes him, but. He’s embarrassed enough, just seeing it.

“It’s like—” David’s hands slice through the air, agitated. “Are you too hungover for metaphors?”

Patrick isn’t looking at him like he’s speaking a different language, at least. “Let’s give it a try.”

“Have you ever seen _Ghost_?”

“If you try to convince me that you’re dead just to fuck with me—”

“Oh my god,” David snorts. “Even I wouldn’t do that to you.”

Patrick looks at him askance. 

“I wouldn’t do it while you were hungover,” David amends. “But you know the movie. Those pottery wheels.”

“Is this a rom com conversation or an art conversation?”

“It’s not _not_ a rom com conversation. But art, mostly, I suppose. I went to a few pottery studios, back when I worked here.”

Patrick nods. He’s looking at the building in front of them and not at David. Small mercies. 

“The clay, you know. It kind of gets shaped by your hands. And it doesn’t even take that much pressure. I remember being surprised by that the first time. But the clay’s already spinning, so the speed and the slightest touch, and everything gets unmade. And then remade.”

Patrick’s looking at him now. David’s sure he sounds pretentious, or like he’s trying too hard. 

“Really easy,” Patrick says. David breathes. “To get remade. And it’s still clay, so it doesn’t feel that different. Until you think about it.”

“Right.” David can’t believe Patrick isn’t laughing at him. But he’s not. “When I left here, I had a lot of time. To think about it.”

“It’s hard not to know yourself.” Patrick says it like he understands. Like maybe he’s clay, too. Or he used to be.

David thinks about the way he felt when he first moved in with Stevie. He really didn’t know himself as well as he thought he did. And he knew that, he knew he was clay, but. He thought he was a little bit something else, too. At least partly. And then he spent more time with Stevie, and he was still clay, he was still a whole lot of clay, but he knew himself better. 

He still loves rom coms, and he still likes popcorn with inexplicable flavors and toppings. He still loves art, which. It would have been easier if he could shed that passion like snakeskin, just let it slip right off of him with all of the hurt from the gallery and all of the expectations and failure he left behind him like a super obvious trail leading straight from who he thought he was to who he is now. But it’s him. And even though that hurts, it’s kind of nice to know, too. At least that much was real.

He clears his throat. “I think it’s better now, at least.”

“You?” Patrick asks. “Or the building? Because, David, it’s a dog groomer and pet cafe. It doesn’t look great. Or like it’s long for this world, honestly.”

And David laughs, and blinks, and they keep walking. Patrick’s still hungover, and David wants to see the face he makes when he tries to drink coffee. 

He feels the silence like a physical presence, pressing down around his shoulders. Stretching him out. But David’s made of sturdier stuff, now.

Once the building’s a block or two behind them, while David’s still casting about for a change of subject, Patrick puts a hand on David’s shoulder, just for a second, and squeezes. “I think it’s good that your foot’s on the wheel now.”

David’s eyes are burning, and the back of his neck is burning. Something in his chest is burning, too. “Same for you,” he manages. 

***

“What’s the verdict?” 

Patrick sips at the dirty chai he’d ordered on the barista’s recommendation. There’s something sharp cutting through what would otherwise be a great drink, but it is pepping him up some. “Not as bad as I thought.”

“Glowing praise,” David laughs. 

Patrick’s eyes wander down to where David’s hands are clasped around his own drink. They’re magnetic, or something. Patrick can’t avoid looking at David’s lithe fingers and delicate wrists for long. At least he has an excuse at the bar, since David’s hands are usually involved in pouring drinks, except for that frozen margarita machine Wendy’s been bugging David to use. Patrick thinks about David’s hands, and the ways Patrick wants to be shaped now. And he carefully pokes at the parts of himself where he’s been stretched too thin or twisted unnaturally for so long that he doesn’t feel it anymore. 

“Bite of my cinnamon roll for your thoughts? I’d offer more, but Ivan is a genius and I don’t know if you’ll properly appreciate his art.” David’s voice is light and unassuming, which makes Patrick want to talk to him even more.

“Do you—” Patrick stops himself. This side of the conversation is unfamiliar, and he doesn’t know how to ask David to pass judgment on his life without taking it personally. 

David takes another bite of his breakfast and waits. There’s a spot of frosting on his nose, which somehow makes Patrick more comfortable. It’s a visible crack in David’s armor. Patrick doesn’t feel so alone in this place where things don’t make sense.

“How did you talk to your parents about this stuff?” Patrick asks. Something in his shoulders loosens when he finally pushes the words out. He already feels like the floor is steadier under him. 

“I wish I had better advice,” David says. He winces. “I brought a couple home in college and just told my parents to deal with it.”

“Yeah, that might not work for me.” Patrick imagines the face his mom would make if he surprised her by bringing a date home. Then he tries not to think about how impossible going on a date feels. The idea appeals, but it’s miles away. There’s so much to do before he could let himself sink into the feeling of being in a relationship. Selfishly, he doesn’t want to force himself to compromise for a while, either. He wants to figure out who he is and how this new identity, which doesn’t tug or pull at him like others have, feels as it’s wrapped snugly around him.

“I don’t know much about how to have that heartfelt conversation...thing,” David says slowly. “I do know that you _have_ to do it on your terms.” Conviction bleeds into his voice, and he’s sure in a way that Patrick rarely sees him. 

“It’s all so frustrating. There aren’t any rules.” Patrick knows he’s whining, but he can’t help himself. “I wanted to go home and do it in person, but I don’t have time to do that for a while. But then I don’t want to wait to tell them. I just want them to know.” That’s the crux of it. Patrick doesn’t want to talk around it on the phone until the holidays, and then he doesn’t want to overshadow the holidays with it. He just wants it to exist in all of their understandings.

“Then let them know.” David talks around a bite of dough and icing. He puts a sticky hand on Patrick’s and squeezes, then pulls it away. Patrick’s not brave enough to trap the hand between his own. “And, much as it pains me to say, maybe lose the expectation that it’s going to be perfect? Because it won’t be. You’ll trip over your words and get snotty, or your parents will.”

Patrick lets that one expectation drop from the weight of the others he’s carrying. “Noted.”

“It’s a hard thing. And a brave thing.” David hands the last bite of his cinnamon roll to Patrick, uses a napkin to clean off his hands, and starts walking.

Patrick follows in his wake. David’s boots crunch against leaves on the sidewalk, and he tucks the hand that’s not holding his coffee into his pocket. Patrick’s eyes track the lines of David’s shoulders and the curl of his fingers around the paper cup.

As they wander back toward David’s apartment, David shows Patrick a store that sells bath products that are “surprisingly high-quality.” David tugs Patrick inside and grabs his hand to drop some lotion in for him to sample. 

Patrick sinks into the way he smells a little bit like David now. David shows Patrick that being brave can be done, even when it's hard. Even when it gets so hard that Patrick learns just how strong David is. But Patrick thinks he might be able to do it. He might be able to respond to all of the messages that are piling up on his phone as much as small digital notifications can ever pile up. 

He wants to talk to his parents, to say "I'm starting to feel right," to say, "I want to talk to you about it now that I'm feeling this way," to say, "still love me, please still love me," and David makes him think that he might be able to do that. 

***

“David? Are you going to let me in?”

David sits up. He’s pretty foggy after downing way more than the recommended dosage of Dayquil, but that sounds like Patrick. He makes a noise that he hopes is close to Patrick’s name, but his voice has taken the day off. Maybe the week. 

“David? Can you hear me?”

That’s definitely Patrick. David is never going to allow himself to get sick again. He casts a critical eye around the room. There’s a wastebasket next to the couch, because he’s not a baby and also Stevie informed him that she would not be cleaning up his used tissues. But there are at least seventeen half-full glasses of water, orange juice, and the regrettably herbal tea that Stevie made in an attempt to be supportive. She has since decamped to a friend’s couch until he stops being radioactive with flu germs, because she has finals coming up.

There’s another knock on the door. David struggles out of his blankets and only trips once. He makes it to the door and twists the knob to let Patrick in.

His breath catches when he sees Patrick. He elects to blame the reaction on the mucus in his lungs and the fact that he hasn’t gotten a full night’s sleep for seventy-two hours. 

“What are you doing here?” It comes out as a croak, and David spares some of his limited brainpower to be thankful that Patrick isn’t interested in him. He looks like death and sounds worse, all scratchy and gravelly. 

“I heard through the grapevine that you were sick.”

“Are we calling my sister a grapevine now? Because she’s really more like poison oak.” But then David’s thinking about the rash he got as a kid and how his mom locked him in his room for three straight days—his own fault, really—and he shudders.

“Your voice is really wrecked, huh? Alexis said you like those cherry cough drops. I read an article that said cough drops are basically candy, but you’re sick, so you get to live in denial.” Patrick gives the tote bag slung over his shoulder a shake.

David sways. He’s pretty sure this is a cough syrup-fueled apparition. He had his qualms about expired medicine. 

“Here, let’s get you back on the couch,” Patrick says. His eyes scan David’s whole body, from the soles of his slipper socks to the tip of what must be his truly horrific bedhead. David would feel more embarrassed if the thought of getting horizontal didn’t sound so appealing. And, of course, this is a vitamin C-fueled hallucination. So it’s not worth kicking Patrick out, even if his bright red slipper socks alone would normally get Patrick banned from David’s presence for a two-week minimum.

“I can—”

But Patrick’s already grabbing his shoulders and steering him back toward the couch. This is just like _You’ve Got Mail_ , David thinks. Except Patrick doesn’t want to be his Tom Hanks, and also David knows who Patrick is. And David doesn’t remember the password for his email account. 

“I brought soup and crackers, but did you want something to drink?” Patrick eyes the cups scattered across the table and then stands. He stacks them up, like it’s nothing. Like this isn’t the nicest anyone has been to David while he’s sick in...he shakes his head. A while. 

“Soup?” 

Patrick’s smiling at David, and he doesn’t have the mental faculty to deal with that even when he’s not convalescing. “Soup. You went on and on about the baked potato soup from that cafe by Ted’s place for almost ten minutes last week.”

“I like baked potato soup.”

“I’m glad to hear that,” Patrick says patiently. At least, David thinks Patrick is being patient. He’s generally pretty wonderful, and now he’s brought soup. David thinks he might be a knight, or something. “Are you running a fever?”

David grunts. “Dropped the thermometer yesterday. Cold, though.”

Patrick crouches down next to David’s head, brushes his hair back, and puts his fucking _cold_ hand against David’s forehead. 

“Sorry, sorry. It’s cold outside. You’re burning up, though.”

It’s hard to swallow, but for a different reason than the tickle at the back of David’s throat that’s been giving him hell.

“I’m going to heat up your soup.” Patrick stands up and grabs the neatly stacked cups and mugs. He takes them into the kitchen with him. “And I’m bringing you tea and water.”

David debates texting Stevie, but this is a fever dream. Stevie’s teasing would be even more unbearable than her current levels of prodding about Patrick and his earnest eyes and sturdy hands, especially because this isn’t happening. Best to keep it to himself, just in case. He turns his face into the pillow and takes a breath. 

When he wakes up, disoriented and feeling like his watery brain was scooped out of his ears while he was sleeping but slightly less feverish, he feels nauseous for an entirely new reason. The mug Patrick filled with tea for him is still sitting on the coffee table. He checks his feet, and the slipper socks are sadly also real. 

He will not be letting himself get sick ever again.

***

“This isn’t the way that I wanted to tell you.” Patrick takes a breath. He can’t get past how wrong it feels to do this over the phone. “Sorry. I don’t know how to do this. I guess it doesn’t come naturally.”

“Patrick.” His dad’s voice is warm. It’s the same voice that woke him up every morning for school, firm and kind in equal measure. “Stop. Tell us how you’d rather tell us.”

“I’d be home.” 

“Good start,” his mom says quietly. 

He almost lets the guilt stop him there, but he can’t half-tell them. So he keeps going. “I’d help mom with dinner, even though I’m more of a harm than a help. I would at least do the dishes. Then I’d grab us all a beer.” Patrick keeps talking and tells them how he’d sit them down with his mom’s favorite photo albums. He knows exactly the photo he would flip to, the one where his dad’s taking a crooked selfie with a digital camera while Marcy helps Patrick swing a bat. And then he’d say how much it meant to him that both of his parents were always there for him. He covers his eyes for this next part, like that will make it easier, and it kind of does. “And then I’d tell you I’m gay, and say that I hope you could accept that.”

The silence hangs. Patrick feels a wild urge to say it again, just to make sure they heard. 

Ten seconds and a million years later, his mom hums. “Your dad looks so silly in that picture. His forehead is so big.” 

Patrick forces a laugh because it feels like he’s supposed to. “I…guess?” 

But then his mom clears her throat. “I remember that day. You cried and refused to eat your lunch until you could hit the ball past second base.” 

“So you didn’t eat until dinner,” his dad adds. 

“And I thought there was no way I could love that stubborn boy more,” his mom says. “Though I still don’t know where he gets his competitive streak from.” 

Patrick snorts. 

“I have an idea,” his dad mutters. 

“But,” his mom says. 

Patrick’s breath catches. Not a super affirming way to start the sentence. “But?” He asks. 

“But,” his mom says again. “I’ve loved the man you’ve become every step of the way. And I want love for you, as much as possible.” 

Patrick sniffles. He thought he might end the call crying, but this is the best reason he could have hoped for. Still, something makes him ask, “Dad?” 

Patrick’s dad exhales. “You’re my favorite kid. That’s still true.” 

God, Patrick’s dad is such a dad sometimes. But once he’s run his dad’s words through their dad-to-normal filter, he’s pretty sure he’s in the clear. “I think that’s a good thing.” 

“You’re the best thing,” Patrick’s mom hurries to reassure him. 

“Good,” Patrick says, but it sounds like a sob even to his own ears. “That’s…god. That’s really good. I love you guys.” 

“We love you.” His dad’s voice is warm, and he says they love him just like he says it’s going to rain, or that his mom is going to lose at cribbage. Like he’s sure. Like he knows. 

Patrick’s mom clears her throat. “Just out of curiosity, is there a particular...person? That might be motivating this?” 

“Marcy.” Clint cuts her off. “But is there?” he asks. 

Patrick laughs. “I’m not dating anyone." 

“I know that tone,” his dad says. “What’s his name?” 

And the world opens up. Patrick didn’t think he would ever get this. He spent so long not talking to his parents about things, or talking around things, that he feels like he’s glowing now that they know and they’re okay with it. It’s that buzzy, known feeling that makes him say, “I don’t know how to ask him out. He’s so…” 

He sighs. Then he wants to hit his head against the table until he forgets that he’s thirty years old and sighing about a boy to his parents over the phone. 

“We haven’t given you romantic advice since you were fourteen,” Marcy says. “God, and you told Rachel that she had pretty hair and also people thought that the two of you were dating, and then you asked if she wanted them to be right.” 

“So you’re saying that I need a new move.” 

His mom laughs at him. 

Patrick’s a neon sign. He hopes that Ted and Alexis’s apartment has tinted windows, or the neighbors will be up all night in his light. 

“You could—" 

But his mom shushes his dad. “Your dad and I started dating because I told him we had been on five dates already. He doesn’t get a vote.” 

His dad harrumphs. "I thought the people think we’re dating line was good when I gave it to you then, and you know what? I stand by it now. Got the job done and it was a damn good story.”


	4. white claw

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Endless thanks to [Amy](https://roguebabyinyourstore.tumblr.com/) and [Megan](https://stuck-on-your-heart.tumblr.com/) for their support and cheerleading when this chapter was being uncooperative!

Patrick wakes up to his phone buzzing. It’s irritating, the sound of the phone in its place against the wood of the windowsill. He doesn’t have a nightstand because this room is basically Alexis’s office full-time now, except for when Patrick’s asleep. Actually, sometimes Alexis brings in her laptop and talks to herself while Patrick’s sleeping, he’s pretty sure. Either that or he’s had some oddly specific dreams lately. 

He sighs before he remembers that he's not avoiding his parents anymore. The texts were the worst, before. They were the most consistent. Patrick felt bad every time he got a message. It’ll probably take a while to shake that reflex.

But this message isn’t from his family. It’s from David. 

It’s a pretty mediocre sunrise picture, all things considered. The morning colors are barely the focus. Instead, Patrick is looking at windows in downtown Toronto and the way the sun reflects off of them as it climbs higher in the sky. He can see the top of David’s head, covered by the gray beanie he’s taken to wearing now that there’s a chill in the air. Behind him, pink light is reflecting off of the windows of The Inn. There’s a text, too.

**sometimes it takes until morning to rearrange the bottles when wendy decides we should organize them by color**

**so many brown bottles, patrick**

Patrick snorts. David normally finishes up around three, after he’s herded out any stragglers post-last call. But he was there until—he checks the timestamp—six-thirty this morning.

He wishes he could see David’s face, or even his hair under his hat. The sunrise would probably reflect off of his brown-but-almost-black hair, colors playing through the strands. And his cheeks would probably be flushed from the cold. He wonders if David was yawning, and if his nose scrunched up when he did. 

Then he puts his phone down. The photo is anything but mediocre, now that he’s thinking about it.

He picks it up again, because he’s a glutton for punishment, and wonders if maybe he should offer to walk David home. But it’s been ten minutes now since David sent the picture, and he’s probably halfway to his apartment already. And if he’s been up since before his shift, he’s probably talked out and at the end of his rope. Past the end of his rope. And there's a chill in the mornings now, so he doesn’t want to make David wait for him. 

But David’s never talked out, Patrick thinks. Not that he’s seen. And if he is, then maybe they could just walk in silence. And then maybe their hands could brush, or something. Except Patrick isn’t going to call David.

David’s hands are so big. His hands are so big, and all of David is so warm. Would his hands be warm? Patrick pulls the quilt over his head and looks at the photo again. If the air is as crisp as he thinks it is, could Patrick tuck his hand into David’s and tell him he needed to warm it up? Would David smile and rub his fingers against Patrick’s palm, oh, or maybe take Patrick’s hand between both of his own and rub them against his skin, creating friction and heat and letting something spark in between their fingertips? And if Patrick was a different person, a braver person, a person who took chances and held David’s hand and knew how to say what he wanted to tell David, maybe he could say his lips were cold, too.

Patrick sits up and fights the quilt, which is tangled around his head. The static shocks him, and it brings him back to himself. This is getting out of hand. 

He checks his phone again—just one more look—and swears. He’s going to be late for work. 

***

“Mom wanted me to ask if you got the new arrangement she sent over.”

“Of course I did. She sent it by carrier, so she knows I got it.” David doesn’t look up from the pot he’s stirring on Alexis’s stove. He finally got her to agree to eat carbs for dinner, and he’s not going to blow this opportunity. 

“And?” Alexis taps her finger against his arm impatiently. 

He shakes her off and grabs a box of spaghetti. The girl can’t live off of smoothies forever.

"And I can’t believe that she thinks giving me more solos will make me more likely to attend, not less. I don’t want any more responsibility for what I inflict on unsuspecting partygoers than I used to have.”

“Ugh, I know.” Alexis tries to hold the cheese out of David’s reach, as though he wouldn’t go to embarrassing lengths for mozzarella. “She said that she won’t allow you to deprive your public of another year of song and holiday merriment." She lets David win the cheese battle so she can punctuate her words with fluttery air quotes. "I told her that she could perform alone again and she lectured me about harmonies for, like, an hour.”

“An hour?” David’s surprised that she let Alexis off so easily.

“It _felt_ like an hour.” 

“Also,” David tears some basil, “absolutely we can deprive the public. I choose to deprive them. It’s a mercy.”

“It’s not that bad.” But Alexis won’t meet his eyes.

“It is absolutely that bad.” 

Satisfied, David motions for a few bowls. After he’s dished up the food into two bowls and argued with Alexis for five minutes about how much pasta there should be in one serving, he pulls out a seat at the counter next to his sister. They tuck in, and even though Alexis said she didn’t really want a big dinner, she accepts the second helping David puts in front of her.

“I’m just saying, David,” Alexis puts a hand on David’s hand. He can’t let that stand, so he shakes it off. She continues, undeterred. “Patrick's not your usual type. But, hello, Ted's not mine. And we are thriving.”

“They're both so nice.” David still doesn’t understand it. “How are they both so nice?”

“Okay, but Ted won't get a bigger place even though I could really use the closet space?” Alexis kind of looks like she’s going to grab David’s hand again. “And Patrick thinks he's way funnier than he is.”

David feels defensiveness rising up, but Alexis isn’t even talking about him, so he doesn't know where it's coming from. “Ted also thinks he's way funnier than he is.”

“But you're right,” Alexis's voice is softer than usual. She spears a tomato with her fork. “They're pretty nice.” 

David nods. He twirls the pasta around his fork, again and again.

“I don't think we're that nice," Alexis says.

David wants to grab Alexis’s hand now, except he would never do that. And besides, they’re eating. “But you and Ted are thriving.”

“And you and Patrick could be, too.”

David shakes his head. “I’m definitely not nice.” 

“You have your moments.”

“That’s what Mom used to say about Joyce DeWhitt. Forgive me if I don’t take it as a compliment.”

"I'm just saying.” Alexis fiddles with her hair. “You're kind of like that baker." 

"What?" David says, hackles up. "I do not have gray hair. I have checked every day this week." 

Alexis rolls her eyes. "Not that part, David. I just mean, you kind of had your own little bakery. At the gallery." 

David rolls his eyes back at her. "Yeah, except the baker doesn't have overbearing parents who baked all of her bread and also sold it all for her to people who didn't even _want_ bread in the first place. If she did, she'd have a new fryer by now." 

David couldn't get a donut that morning, either. Still saving up for a new one, Marie said. It's the kind of thing that wouldn't have made him blink this time two years ago. He'd have a new fryer installed if for no other reason than that he’d had a craving for one of those donuts since he brought the place up last week. 

"Mom and Dad did _not_ bake the bread," Alexis scoffs. "You did that. You're the one who did the website, and got all those artists." 

David feels something sharp poking at the soft parts of him, but it doesn't sting quite yet. It just aches. He had tried really hard. Embarrassingly hard. 

"And, okay," Alexis puts her hand on his. He fights the urge to shake it off. "The theme was all very pretentious." 

"Thanks so much." 

"Oh my god, David, will you please let me finish?" 

He waves a hand. It’s all he’s willing to give her.

"It was exactly right for those dumb posers who would buy that kind of art anyway. You know, all those splattered canvases and repurposed textiles." 

David really hated some of those exhibitions. 

"It was good, okay? You were good." Alexis takes a drink from her water bottle, like she didn't just expose all of David's vulnerabilities and then, miraculously, soothe some of them. "That's all I'm saying."

***

“All I'm saying is that a speaker series is not the same as an exhibition.” 

Patrick smiles and watches David’s hands make his drink. The motions are starting to become familiar to him. David is meticulous and particular, and he follows the same path every time. It’s soothing. 

“I’m sorry that the Museum of Contemporary Art has betrayed you this way,” he says seriously. 

David levels a playful glare his way. “Such a patronizing tone from someone who’s never even been there.”

Patrick breathes. Maybe this is it—an opening, a chance for him to tell David what he wants. He opens his mouth, _let’s go, together,_ on the tip of his tongue.

“A local art museum,” someone drawls from behind Patrick. Patrick turns toward the interjector. He's objectively stunning, tall and lithe with tousled hair and a strong jawline. But his jacket is hopelessly wrinkled in a way that could only be done on purpose. And his eyes are trained on David, something predatory in them. Like a shark seeking prey. Patrick dislikes him immediately.

David’s looking, too. 

“Different from the high-end circles you thought you were running around in before, hm?” The man looks David up and down.

David focuses all of his attention on Patrick’s drink. His movements are different now. More tentative. Stiffer. 

“What are you doing here, Sebastien?” He asks. His voice is a little colder and a lot smaller than Patrick has grown used to. Patrick doesn’t like that, either.

Patrick itches to say something, to do something. But that something, both what would work and what David would let him get away with, is unclear. 

“You’re looking well, David Rose,” the man—Sebastien, _oh_ , this is Sebastien—says. “The physicality of your new vocation seems to agree with you.”

David clears his throat. He looks slightly more like himself as he pours Patrick’s drink into a glass and slides it across the bar to him.

“Can I get you a drink, Sebastien? Or are you just here to offer vague cynicisms in my general direction?” 

Patrick coughs to hide his laugh. David is certainly something. But Patrick knew that already.

“Such a change, to toil like this every day.” Apparently, Sebastien won’t be deterred. “I toil for my art, of course, but it serves a higher goal. Must feel different, to toil for such a...base impulse, as a drink.”

“Okay.” David’s voice and gaze go hard. Patrick thinks it’s a little hot. Then he feels bad for finding it hot. “First of all, I work in a bar, not a salt mine. So thanks so much for your concern, but I’m doing just fine.”

It’s more than a little hot. Patrick is a bad person.

“And, Sebastien? At what point _exactly_ do you toil? Is it when your parents pay for all of your equipment?”

Patrick wishes vaguely that he had popcorn.

“Or maybe,” David continues, “it’s when you try to get your boyfriend to show your photos in his gallery and then lash out when he says no?” 

The smug look drops from Sebastien’s face. “I had hoped that your fall from such heights would humble you,” he says. “But I should have known you’re more stubborn than that.”

David rolls his eyes. “A drink, Sebastien? I’d say it’s on me, but as you seem to enjoy reminding me, I can’t really afford to do that right now.”

Patrick sips his drink. It’s really, really hot, and he is a really, really bad person.

Sebastien mumbles something about a party and turns to leave.

David rolls his eyes again at Sebastien’s back. Once Sebastien is out the door, David’s shoulders slump. He braces both hands on the bar and takes a deep breath. 

“Even if it’s a lie, can you tell me I won that interaction, please?” David asks. Patrick looks on, surprised, as all of David’s confidence and bravado leak out of him along with the tension that Sebastien’s presence caused. 

“Of course you did,” Patrick says. “He couldn’t even think of anything to say by the end.”

“Thank you,” David wiggles his shoulders, just a little. _There_ he is. “Ugh, that was the worst.”

Patrick reaches out and covers one of David’s hands with his own. Then he thinks twice. He pats David’s hand once, awkwardly, before picking up his drink again. 

“You held your own really well,” Patrick offers. He’s at a loss, still reeling from the whiplash of David’s freefalling confidence. 

“About time, I suppose,” David says. “How’s the drink?”

“Great,” Patrick says, trying to catch up with David’s thought process, “of course it’s great.”

David smiles at him, a real smile, even if it gets tucked away quickly. “Glad to hear.”

“Have you,” Patrick doesn’t know how to say this. “Has he—come in, before?”

“Not here,” David says. “But he came by my apartment the day after I found out about the gallery, and then I saw him again at a party a week or so later, before I stopped going to those.”

Patrick raises his eyebrows. “I’m surprised he keeps coming back.”

David makes a questioning noise.

“Since you won that interaction, and all,” Patrick clarifies. “Must be a glutton for punishment.”

David laughs. “Oh my god, this is the first time I’ve come out even remotely ahead, if I even did and you’re not just being nice to me out of pity.”

That doesn’t sound right to Patrick. “I can’t picture that.”

“Please don’t try. It was...bad, the other times. I wasn’t in a great place, before. I think I cried the first time.” David pauses. “Okay, I know I did. I’m pretty sure I did the second time, too, but I was also very drunk, so. Also, it was raining, so it’s not worth thinking too much about whether the water was rain or not.”

“I get it.” Patrick senses that David is done with this conversation. Still, he hates the look in David’s eyes, like he feels wrong or small. David should never feel small. “Well, one out of three isn’t bad,” Patrick says, nodding decisively. “And you definitely won this one. It was a privilege to watch.”

David doesn’t smile, but there’s something pleased in his expression. “I’d say anytime, but I’m really hoping that never happens again.”

“Well,” Patrick takes another drink, just to have something to do. “If it does, I’d like a front-row seat.” 

David looks at Patrick in a different way than usual. Patrick can’t figure out what to do about that look right now, two drinks in, but it makes him feel warm. David makes him feel warm.

To Patrick’s surprise, David actually talks to him about Sebastien. He details the whole relationship, for a broad definition of the term, as he closes up. And he keeps telling Patrick about Sebastien as they go back to David’s for a nightcap.

“There’s no way he said that.” Patrick takes off his shoes and tries to wrap his head around someone asking for one last fuck to remember him by. “He’s a three-dimensional person, not a cartoon character.”

David laughs and nods. “I promise, he did. And please, for my sake, never call Sebastien three-dimensional in front of me ever again.”

“Got it.”

“Want anything to drink?” David asks. He gestures toward his fridge. 

Patrick nods. “What are my options? Anything as highbrow as I can get at the bar?”

“I’m afraid it’s more lowkey than all that,” David waves a hand. He grabs a tall white can and holds it up, label facing Patrick.

“You drink White Claws?” Patrick tries to fit this information into his mental David file. It doesn’t slot in neatly. Another contradiction to add to the pile that makes up David. Patrick wants to learn them all. 

“They’re delicious. Of course I drink White Claws. I have black cherry and lime.”

“Lime,” Patrick decides. 

David nods, pleased, and grabs two cans. He gestures toward the couch, and Patrick follows him there. 

David sets one of the drinks on the coffee table in front of Patrick. “The right decision.”

Patrick basks in the light of David being happy with him. It feels good when David is happy with him. “You prefer lime, too?”

David shakes his head and bites back a smile. “Black cherry is the best.” He turns his own can so Patrick can see the label. “This way, I don’t have to give any of them up.”

Patrick likes him so much. “Smart.”

“I have my moments.” David pops the tab on his own can and clinks it against Patrick’s, which was still on the coffee table. Patrick shouldn’t be having so many feelings about the sound their cans make as they tap together. He shouldn’t have so many feelings about David’s drink choices, either. 

He does, though. 

David leans against the arm of the couch and sips his drink. “Ugh, I can’t think anymore. Want to pick something to watch?”

Patrick takes the remote David handed him and then takes the opportunity to smile the way he wants to, the way he’d be embarrassed for David to see, once David turns the lights in the living room off.


	5. hasta la altavista

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Endless love to [Megan](https://stuck-on-your-heart.tumblr.com) for supplying David and Stevie dialogue! And, you know, for everything.

“I can’t talk for long,” Patrick says. It’s not his favorite way to start a conversation with his mom, especially now that they’re talking more. But he’s at the bar, and he would go outside to take the call but it’s filling up and he doesn’t want to lose his seat. He has a really good view of the game on the screen above the bar. And, fine, okay, the view of David’s arms as he shakes cocktails and pours for customers is not the worst, either. 

“I get it,” his mom says. “I’ll be quick. Are you coming back anytime before Thanksgiving? We’re planning family get-togethers and didn’t know if we should plan around you.”

Something in Patrick warms. He still gets to have this. “Work’s pretty busy until the holidays, but I could come back pretty soon after the new year? I can check about early December, too.”

“Of course. Any plans for the weekend?”

Patrick isn’t sure how to answer. He’s spent every weekend since he arrived with either Ted, Alexis, Stevie, or David, or some combination of them all. He wants to learn the city on his own, but every time he tries to make solo plans, he feels a rush of lame rooted in the small town he grew up in. It feels wasteful to spend a Sunday reading his book in his pajamas, but it’s all he really wants to do. 

“We’ll see. Most of my friends are busy, and I just got this new biography.”

His mom laughs at him, which should make him more indignant than it does. “And you’re going to turn into a hermit until you finish it. Is it a good book, at least?”

“It’s about Lady Jane Grey and inheritance. You’d hate it.” Patrick can’t believe how easy this is. He can see David out of the corner of his eye, and he’s talking to his mom, and the world hasn’t crumbled around him.

“So have you asked that boy out yet, honey?” His mom asks. She’s tentative now, he can tell. Worried that she’ll push further than Patrick wants her to go. 

This is still new for both of them. He’s never really had secrets from his parents, but it’s never felt quite so intentional before. He wants to let his mom know that this is okay, that he wants to share this with her. But David’s a few stools down pouring Ronnie a drink. 

“Oh, you know,” he says. “Still a work in progress.” 

His mom hums. “Patrick,” she says. The laughter leaks out of her voice. “Should I leave you alone about this?” 

Patrick sighs. No, he wants to say. I want you to know, because I can’t believe you know and it’s okay. I can’t imagine having to stop telling you things again. It was so hard last time. “I’m actually at a bar,” he says. 

His mom, for all that her timing is the worst, is still pretty sharp. “Oh,” she laughs, “you’re at a bar. _The_ bar, I assume. And he’s there?” 

Patrick’s ears are going to melt off of his head. “That is correct.” 

“I can leave you to it, then. Don’t use the ‘people think we’re dating’ line. I love your father, but he’s never once been called smooth.” 

Patrick laughs, just like he knows his mom wants him to. He kind of wants him to, too. “Loud and clear.” 

“Call me tomorrow,” his mom says, then hangs up.

***

“Two words, Alexis. ‘Hey David. Hi David. Oh hi.’ Anything. Wave me down again, I dare you. I will make you a rum and coke and you’ll have to deal with that horrific hangover and I won’t be sorry.”

“Ugh, that’s not fair.” Alexis throws her hands in the air and narrowly misses knocking over Stevie’s drink. “You know I can’t stand sugary sodas.” 

“I could always give you UV Blue instead,” David says sweetly. He’s going to chop off her arm next time she waves it at him like he’s a passenger on the Titanic and she’s on shore as he leaves. “Would that be better?”

“I haven’t been able to stomach UV Blue since I was fifteen, David.” Alexis primly sticks the straw in her mouth. 

Of course David knows that. He held her hair back on the night the stuff was ruined forever for her, when the other teen models in her Hollister campaign poured it into a bowl filled with Crystal Light, insecurity, and bad decisions. 

“It’s not that bad with lemonade,” Stevie pipes up. 

Alexis rolls her eyes. “Thank you Stevie, but it’s actually so bad, especially when you have such painful memories associated with it.”

“It’s not like sugar-free, zero-calorie Crystal Light is really lemonade, though.” David should know. He practically lived off the stuff for a month once, and he’ll never go back.

Stevie nods solemnly. “That’s like me and Fireball.”

“Why am I not surprised that it’s Fireball for you?” David asks. He holds up a finger and walks over to a few new customers. They want frozen margaritas, and by the time he disabuses them of that notion and makes them a few mango margaritas on the rocks, he’s hoping that Stevie and Alexis will have moved on. 

No such luck.

“Peach Burnett’s, too,” Stevie says when he walks back over. “Though it’s surprisingly not as bad as you might expect.”

“The real question is why you tried so many peach vodkas,” David tells her. “Did you not sense that their terribleness would become a theme?”

Alexis lists a few more drinks that have been ruined for her. They are predictably, terrifyingly international. 

“You’re probably the same, David.” Alexis sips her drink. David made it with ginger ale, just to fuck with her, and either she hasn’t noticed or she’s not going to give him the satisfaction of a reaction. “You spent so much time in Japan. Sake’s got to be ruined for you.”

“Shockingly, no.” David’s just as surprised as Alexis. “No bad memories.”

“Then what is it for you?” Stevie asks.

“I don’t have anything like that,” he insists. 

Stevie hums. “Schapps.” 

David shakes his head. 

“Kahlua,” Alexis offers. 

“Nope.” The smell of whiskey still makes him queasy when he serves it straight-up, but he’s not going to give them any ammunition.

***

Patrick lets the sharp, almost bitter taste of grapefruit dance on his tongue. He wants it to center him, but he’s still off-kilter. In the movies that David’s so fond of quoting and referencing and forcing Patrick to watch, things get really easy once people make the bold choice to start over. He’s still waiting for that part to happen for him. The words Rachel left in his voicemail dance through his head. At least he can now confirm that she still fights mean. He casts about for a distraction until the precise moment that Ronnie sits down, at which point he would rather stew in his bad mood.

She seems to be nursing a rain cloud that matches his own. Patrick spares a moment to be sorry for David, who now has to deal with both of them. 

David is too smart to ask Ronnie questions when she’s had a bad day. But he does ask her to rate her day, and Patrick blinks and lets the comparisons he draws pull him out of this rotten place in his head. 

“Is it like the time I thought Alexis had been taken by the Yakuza because she was dating that kingpin’s nephew? Or is it like the time where we knew exactly where she was and how long until the flight we’d scheduled, but she wouldn’t pick up her fucking phone? Or,” David shudders, “is it as bad as that haircut I came in with in 2011 that made you laugh until you snorted coffee out of your nose?” 

Ronnie almost snorts her drink out of her nose again at the memory of that haircut. “There are few things as bad as that haircut,” Ronnie finally says, once she’s stopped laughing. 

Patrick is sitting a few stools away, but teasing David might be just the thing to distract him. He thinks a lot about how to get David to make that indignant and charmed face of his. “And you wouldn’t happen to have any pictures,” he says quietly. He’s still unsure where he stands with her. 

Ronnie inclines her head. “Part of my whole free drinks deal is a vow of silence,” she says. 

David snorts. “That is absolutely not part of the deal.” 

Patrick gets the sense that she doesn’t make it a habit to tell people anything about David that he doesn’t want them to know. He takes another drink and lets Ronnie’s indifference and David’s effort wash over him. 

***

“I get that it’s hard to talk to her,” David says. He keeps his eyes on the glass he’s wiping down. There are gross fingerprints all over everything at the end of the night. But he’s grateful for the busy work to keep the pressure down. 

“It never used to be hard. I just got so—“ Patrick runs a hand through his hair. 

“Used to it?” David offers. 

“Yes. That.” 

David picks up another glass. 

“We started dating in middle school.” Patrick turns his phone over and over in his hands. “I’ve spent more of my life as her boyfriend than anything else. Since I was thirteen. Middle school,” he says again. 

David thinks that it sounds a little bit like a rom com, but Patrick probably won’t appreciate that feedback. 

“That’s really hard to get used to.” He grabs a broom and starts sweeping. 

“It is. And then we kept breaking up and kept getting back together, again and again. We always got back together. So I don’t think she’s really getting it.” 

David winces. “That’s hard,” he says again. He needs to be doing better than this. “Is there something that you could do? To show that it’s different?” 

Patrick shakes his head. “I’m out of ideas. I tried to text her about breaking our lease, but.” He puts his hands on his knees. “It didn’t work.” 

David swallows past the uncertainty clogging his throat and making him doubt himself. This isn’t about him. 

“Maybe just tell her.” It’s the best he can do, to put himself in Rachel’s shoes and think of what he would want. “Tell her as much as you’re comfortable with. It doesn’t have to be everything, and it doesn’t even have to be about you.” 

He relaxes his grip on the broom. He’s way out of his depth here. 

“Tell her about where you live, and your job. Your friends. If she doesn’t hear you, then she doesn’t hear you.” 

Patrick’s eyes are glassy. David has no idea what to do with that. He projects comfort and prickliness in equal measure, so that Patrick feels supported but doesn’t get tears all over the collar of his sweater. 

David puts the broom away and turns back to check on Patrick. It hurts to see strong, sure Patrick folding in on himself like this. 

David puts a hand on his shoulder. “Want to leave and watch a movie and talk about something else?” he asks. 

“More than anything.” 

Patrick leans into David as they walk toward David’s apartment. David lets him. Even if a few errant tears fall onto his sleeve. It’ll wash.

***

Patrick’s knee bounces up and down as the phone rings. The flat ringing makes him want to hang up, but he’s big enough to admit that he would take the flimsiest of excuses to end this call.

“Patrick.”

He swallows. “Rachel. I wasn’t sure you would pick up.”

“Well, I didn’t know how long I would have to wait for you to call if I didn’t answer. I didn’t want to do four more months of this.”

It’s a fair dig, so Patrick doesn’t prod at it. “I get it.”

“I was going to come visit, but your mom said to wait until you called.” Patrick can tell that Rachel’s frustrated; his mom usually encouraged Rachel to pursue Patrick down whatever rabbit hole he’d crawled through during their frequent, frustrating breaks. Once, years ago, his mom called him and handed the phone over to Rachel the moment he answered. 

“Yeah.” Every other word he knows gets stuck in his throat. 

“Yeah?” Rachel seizes on that, just like she has every right to. She hates when Patrick doesn’t do his share of the work. Once, she counted all of the dishes in the sink and did exactly half, leaving all the hard-to-scrub pans with caked on food to his half. “You call me after months of radio silence and unanswered texts and _Facebook messages_ and I get ‘yeah?’”

Patrick almost says it again, but some sense of self-preservation loosens a few more syllables. “I’m sorry. I’ve been awful to you.”

“God,” Rachel sighs. “This has to be the last time, okay? I really thought that we could leave this part of our relationship behind when we got engaged.” There’s a hint of _her_ creeping into her words, and it makes Patrick ache deep in the place that will always care about Rachel. 

“Rachel. I don’t want to get back together.” He feels one more parcel of expectation clatter to the ground at his feet.

She’s quiet for a minute. Patrick doesn’t want to talk before he says something she doesn’t want to hear, so he waits. “Then why the fuck—” Rachel huffs. “I didn’t think you’d be such a dick after only a few months in the city.” She tries for a joke, which Patrick knows spells disaster.

“Works fast.” He tries to meet her where she’s at. “I bumped someone on the sidewalk yesterday and didn’t even apologize.”

“Patrick.”

He blanches and switches gears. “I’m gay, Rach.” It’s a release. It’s the worst silence he’s experienced since he told his parents. Rachel knows about the teddy bear he slept with for about nine years longer than he’s willing to admit to anyone else. She held his hand when the doctor set the broken leg he got sliding into third in high school. 

Finally, she says something. “Oh.” 

It’s better than nothing. “I’m assuming you have questions.”

“More than a few. God, wow. And you—” Her voice is still icy, but it might be thawing. “How long? Wait. Don’t answer that. That can’t be the right question.”

“I don’t think there’s a right question.” It’s advice Patrick can’t make himself take, but saying it to Rachel is easier. 

“That might be even worse. You couldn’t have gotten me a road map before you told me?”

It’s almost teasing. It’s more than he deserves. “I’ll see if I can scrounge up any articles. Text them to you later.”

“And you’re...good, right?” There’s a part of Patrick that will always care for Rachel after fifteen years of being two halves of the same whole. It’s nice to hear some of the same care coming from her.

Patrick swipes at his eyes. “Happier now that you know,” he says honestly. He’s going to tell Rachel the truth, he decides. Anything she wants to know. “Anything else?”

And when she asks, he tells her.

***

David is going to have to do something about this. 

It can’t go on like it has been any longer, he decides. Enough is enough.

Enough is enough, because Patrick came in tonight and laughed. On its own, that wouldn’t call for a change, but when the skin around Patrick’s eyes wrinkled, David felt his own eyes squint reflexively. Like his face had to be as happy as Patrick’s entirely by proximity. 

It doesn’t help, of course, that David has had Patrick’s various laughs memorized since the night of his birthday. So tonight, when Stevie says something cutting under her breath and Patrick inhales in surprise before the laughs start coming, David can trace it back. He remembers the look on Patrick’s face at that show and the way he looked, half in shadow and half in the light of the follow spot that glanced off his shoulder. 

David kind of wants to write jokes down and remind Patrick of them just so that he can hear the laughs again. It’s like when he was a kid and Alexis got a joke book and followed him around reciting the same one over and over because he laughed so hard he snorted the first time, except that was so annoying and he doesn’t want Patrick to think he’s annoying. 

And Stevie nudges David a few minutes after he panics and runs to the kitchen, ostensibly for oranges but really so that he can do some deep breathing without feeling any eyes on him. 

“Maybe you should talk to him,” she says pleasantly. Like it’s not a ridiculous concept. 

“Maybe you should shut your mouth,” David replies, sickly sweet. 

He really doesn’t want Patrick to hear them, because if Patrick thinks he’s annoying, then he maybe won’t come into the bar as much or hang out with David and it’ll be weird because he lives with Alexis and Ted so if he thinks David is annoying then it will be a whole thing. 

He doesn’t want to be outside the door of Patrick’s room, thinking about all of the things he should have said differently or better or maybe not at all. 

But then Patrick laughs from his belly when David tells a story about playing dress up with Alexis. His eyes crinkle up and so does his nose, and it really does not do anything for his face when it’s all scrunched like that. 

But still, David can feel the muscles in his shoulders relax. He’s unspooling around Patrick completely without permission now, which is new and terrifying. 

He doesn’t want to be too much, but there’s only so much he can do when Patrick laughs like that.

***

Patrick didn’t expect the conversation to go where it did. 

It started innocently enough. Patrick was talking about the way his cousin proposed to his girlfriend while David offered his own opinions on the proposal and potential wedding themes and colors. 

Eventually, they started talking about Patrick’s own wedding planning, and the champagne and forest green color scheme Rachel had settled on after months of waffling.

“It might be nice.” David doesn’t look up. “To go on a date.” 

Patrick almost chokes on his drink. David just says that, almost a question. No frills, no fuss. He’s still slicing the peel off of lemons, even. Patrick can’t believe David would just ask like this. He can’t believe David is asking at all.

“Yes,” he says, decisive. He’s taking a page out of David’s book. He says yes so quickly that it feels like the word is punched out of him. “A date. I would love that.”

David nods. “I know Grindr is the stereotype, but I really think Tinder is better. Less expectations, or something. In my experience, at least.”

Patrick takes a second. This is _embarrassing_. Of course David didn’t mean a date with him. Before he can melt into a mortified liquid that they won’t ever be able to get out of the upholstery, he nods. Then he downloads the app at David’s direction. 

A date might still be nice. It would be nice to go on a date. 

***

“So you told him you thought it would be nice if he went on a date?” 

“Yes.” David doesn’t really want to spend any more time on this than he already has, but Stevie never lets him off easy. 

“You said, and I’m quoting, ‘it would be nice to go out on a date.’” 

“Yes, Stevie,” David waves a hand in the air to let off some tension, “Please try to keep up.” 

“And what did he say?” 

“Well, at first he said he would love that, and then I didn’t know what to say because he basically told me to my face that he can’t wait to start dating people who aren’t me, so I said ‘hope it works out’ and pretended to go back to work.” And then he did some deep breathing in the kitchen, but Stevie doesn’t need to know that. David doesn’t even want to know that, and he’s the one who did it. 

“David.” Stevie’s impatient with him in a way she rarely gets. A genuine way. “You’re an idiot.”

“Okay, I am unburdening myself—”

Stevie throws her hands up in the air. David’s pretty sure he taught her that move. “He thought you said it would be nice if the _two of you_ went on a date. That’s why he said ‘I’d love that’. So now he probably thinks you rejected him.” 

David blinks. “Oh fuck.” 

“Yeah.” Stevie nods. “Oh fuck.”

David puts his head in his hands. “What am I supposed to do now?”

Stevie just stares at him. “You know what I'm going to tell you to do." 

"Stew and then drown my sorrows in that massive container of frozen yogurt in the freezer?" 

Stevie bangs her head on the counter. It punctuates each word she says. "Talk. To. Him."

“Alright, don’t give yourself a concussion, my god! I can take a hint.” 

“Take a hint?” she lifts her head up immediately and levels a glare at him that would melt his face off if she could arrange that, he’s pretty sure. “I’m not even going to dignify that with a response. Don’t talk to me until you talk to him.” 

“What, are you going to take a vow of silence?” David rolls his eyes.

Stevie just looks at him. 

He scoffs again, louder. “Are you serious? I’m nationally ranked in throwing tantrums. This isn’t going to work on me.”

Stevie keeps looking at him.

“Ugh. This won’t work.” David walks back to his room, He’s got a few more hours before his shift, and if Stevie’s not going to talk to him, there’s no reason to be anywhere other than his bed. He gets to his bedroom door, then waits. “Seriously? You’re seriously not going to talk to me?” 

Silence. David slams his bedroom door behind him. 

***

Patrick runs a towel through his hair one more time. He rummages in his gym bag before he unearths a shirt; not for the first time that morning, he curses David’s punctuality. The man can never let a text go unanswered. Patrick would find it endearing if it wasn’t absolutely biting him in the ass at the moment.

Patrick had spent an hour typing out a message to David that morning. He wanted to project friendliness and use it to temper his always-simmering desire to be around David. It was a fine line to walk. 

But surely a request to go shopping for his mom’s birthday present is innocent enough. Patrick’s fine with the new state of events. He is. It’ll just take some getting used to. He was banking on having more time to work up to it, though. But David, for the first time since Patrick’s known him, was up and texting before eight. 

He’s had groups of friends before, of course. Close friends, even. But he’s never had this. He’s never had one best friend that’s been this consistent. He needs to find the line where it’s normal to think about him. Where it doesn’t feel like burning whenever he sees black sweaters or cherries or coffee. When he can turn to look at him when Mariah Carey’s playing or they’re watching a movie or he just senses that David’s making a face and not feel like his heart is going to jump out from where it’s trapped between his hands. 

His phone buzzes again. It’s Antonio from Tinder. For the third time this morning. He responds so quickly, and it’s pushing past intriguing into irritating. 

At least Antonio didn’t open with a winking emoji like the last three guys did. He’s pretty sure he got rid of all the innuendos Alexis wrote into his bio, so either he missed a few or those guys had the least imaginative opening lines ever. 

Patrick sighs and pulls up the app. This still doesn’t feel natural or comfortable. The swiping is fine, but he’s too scared to start conversations when he matches with someone. 

‘I’ve never bought candles, do you have a recommendation?’ he types. He presses _send_ quickly and shoulders his bag. He doesn’t want to keep David waiting. 

“This is really nice of you,” he says again as they walk into the third store.

David waves a hand. “Honestly, it’s basically a gift to me. I hate the idea of you getting your mom a present unsupervised—were you planning on getting the same sweater you got her last year but in a different color? She probably deserves better on her birthday.”

Then David smiles at him, and it lights up the place in Patrick’s chest where he keeps his unrealistic flights of fancy.

“You’re sure that your mom doesn’t have any knit throws?”

Patrick had seen his parents’ house every day for years. He’s pretty sure. He opens his mouth to tell David so when that telltale sound rings out from his phone. Shit. Idiot that he is, he forgot to turn off his sound.

David’s lips are pressed together like he’s trying not to laugh. “So you maybe got the app.”

Patrick sighs. “I maybe did.”

“Any luck?” David asks, hands running across the throws arranged on the table in front of them. He holds up a red one.

Patrick wrinkles his nose and shakes his head. “She’s not a fan of red. Maybe greens or blues? And I think I’m bad at the app.”

“What do we think about purple?” David is gentle as he searches for a new throw, and he is careful not to knock over or unfold anything as he pulls out a chunky lavender blanket. “And you can’t be bad at an app.”

“Looks good to me.” Patrick shrugs. “And you can so be bad at an app. A guy sent me just a question mark last night. That’s bad.”

David wrinkles his nose. “That is bad. Here, go pick out a candle she’d like to go with this blanket and give me your phone.”

“Give you my phone?” Patrick’s face is heating up just at the idea. What if David looks at his two unread messages—they both just say “hey” and he has no clue what to do with that—or sees how few matches Patrick has?

“I’ll give you an outsider’s perspective on your profile. Won’t go beyond that. I mean, if you want.”

Patrick nods and hands over the phone. It sounds so logical when David puts it that way.

“It probably sucks,” he warns. “I'm not having very good luck.”

David’s brows furrow like they do when he’s taking something seriously. It’s sweet. Then Patrick reminds himself what David is doing, and it’s less sweet. For once, David’s expression is hard to read. This is torture. 

“No,” David says. “It’s good. This picture of you is great.” He turns Patrick’s phone around and shows Patrick the photo of himself laughing at Ted, just out of frame. “Very cute.” 

Patrick nods and picks up the first candle he sees. He hopes his mom likes lemon. Cute. Does this mean that David thinks that Patrick is cute? Or does it mean that people on the app will think he’s cute?

Patrick bites his lip. “I’m talking to this guy now, and he said something about tobacco cologne. Have you ever used that?”  
  
David wrinkles his nose before he can stop himself. 

“That’s what I thought, too.” He’s relieved to see David’s reaction. Antonio has the most questionable taste but presents it like he's god's gift to society. It’s getting frustrating. 

“Lemon and mint,” David says as he inspects Patrick’s candle before they take it up to the register. “Excellent choice. Great for a kitchen or a porch.”

Patrick is not preening, but there is a spring in his step while his purchases are rung up. 

“I still don’t know what I’m supposed to say when someone just says ‘hey,’” he says as they leave the store. “Do I just say hey back? Is that too short?”

“I once got broken up with through emoji, so maybe take this with a grain of salt. But you probably want to send more than just a hey back.”

“But that’s so stupid,” Patrick says, really gearing up for his rant. “They’re the one who started the conversation. Why should I have to do the work? Why did they even bother starting if they didn’t have anything to say?”

David pats Patrick on the head and smiles kind of crookedly in that way that makes Patrick's heart thump. “Good point.”

David would never send just a hey. David's better than that. _David doesn't want to date you, though_ , his brain reminds him. At least Antonio with the terrible opinions invited you for a drink. 

So he’ll probably go for a drink, he guesses. Might as well. Hopefully Antonio will talk about things other than candles eventually.

***

“Why are you here?”

Alexis huffs and shoulders past David into his apartment. “I’m here to negotiate.”

“Oh,” David nods seriously. “If this is about drugs, I should tell you that I’ve probably been priced out of your market.” He pauses. “And also, I don’t really do that anymore.”

“Ugh, no David. No, it’s about the Christmas party.”

Of course it is. David is so sick of talking about staging and arguing about logistics for an event he won’t even be attending. He gestures imperiously for Alexis to continue.

“Okay.” Alexis situates herself on the couch and clasps her hands together in front of her. “So you and I are both stakeholders. So are Mom and Dad.”

“Do I have to pay your school for this lesson, or is it on the house?”

“Shut up. I also made Patrick a stakeholder when I invited him.”

“You did what?” David can feel the wisps of a headache clanging around his temples. 

“He said he wasn’t sure and he didn’t want to be a third wheel with me and Ted, so your interests,” Alexis pokes his knee, “are in alignment.”

“So what is the purpose of this conversation, then?” David asks. “Is it just to see how quickly you can give me a stress zit? Because I can’t afford the good face cream anymore, so you have an unfair advantage.”

“David.” Alexis’s hands stop fluttering through the air, and her carefree demeanor drops. “It would mean a lot if you came. I want you there.”

And David’s still an easy mark when he can be convinced that he’s wanted, which, great, something fun and terrifying to remember about himself. There’s really only one answer if Alexis is actually asking. 

Then she shakes off the sentiment like a dog after a bath. “Plus, if mom calls me again I’m going to start forwarding my number to yours.”

David shakes his head. He’s not going to jump back into a dynamic that spun him into a tangle so easily. Not without proper groveling. 

At least his parents sent cookies. 

After Alexis leaves, stomping her feet and turning sighs into words, which shows David more than anything that she really has been talking to their mom, David pulls out his phone. 

He’s about to text Patrick when he remembers that he has a date tonight. Unbidden, his mind conjures up Patrick’s Tinder photo, the one that made him pause earlier. Patrick’s objectively cute. His photos are kind of dorky, and he’s a little short, of course. 

David doesn’t know what he would have done if he came across Patrick in the before. Before he deleted the app and then cried into a pillow because it was easier than changing his bio to reflect his new job. Before his schedule got so fucked and made meetups even more of a nightmare. Before the thought of rejection on another front threatened to make him sick every time he tried to chat someone up. 

But Patrick’s going to do well, David thinks. How could he not?

***

Patrick fiddles with the collar of his shirt. It’s tighter around the shoulders than he’s really comfortable with, but Ted assured him that it looked okay. 

This is harder than he remembers. 

He’s still running early, at least. He revels in yet another moment that reminds him he’s still the same person he was, the one who never let his gas tank go below one-quarter before filling up and ate seven peanut butter and marshmallow sandwiches with his grandma when he was nine because she was smiling at him and he wanted her to keep doing it.

He grabs his keys. 

***

“This one’s, like, a wine cooler thing. But not trashy.” David clinks his water with Stevie's glass.

“Obviously.” Stevie lifts the drink and toasts him with it.

“This is such a stupid plan,” David says. It’s easier to make conversation than to watch Stevie decide if she likes it. 

“It’s a trivia night. Pretty low-risk, as plans go.” 

“I just don’t know if it’s a good idea.”

"David," Stevie says, serious in a way she usually only is when she's either high or wine drunk, "did Wendy say this was a good idea?" 

David bites his lip and nods, wanting to look away from Stevie's eyes, which are locked on his own. 

"Which drink are you going to do?" Stevie asks. 

"I don't really think they're..." David waves a hand, aiming for dismissive but sensing that he's missed it by a mile. "I don't think they're good. It's just _Wendy_. She thinks all of my ideas are good. It doesn't mean that they are." 

Stevie frowns. "She thinks all your ideas are good," Stevie repeats. 

David nods once, a quick thing. 

"David," Stevie says. "Wendy thinks all of your ideas are good. It's possible that maybe, just maybe, all of these ideas are good. How long has Wendy had this bar?" 

"Years," David says, begrudging. 

"Years," Stevie repeats, inclining her head. "So. You can trust her opinion, probably." 

"I don't know if I'd go that far," he says. "Most of Wendy's ideas are not good."

When someone knocks on the door, Stevie just looks at David. She gestures toward the drink (her sixth) in her hand; the wine cooler is apparently her favorite. 

David sighs, put-upon, and stands to answer it. He feels surprisingly clear-headed; usually he makes two of every drink when he strong-arms Stevie into being his guinea pig. Tonight, he wanted to avoid the neon and sugar. He didn’t envy Stevie’s hangover. 

Patrick is on the other side of the door, hand raised like he’d gotten impatient and gone to knock again before David got there. 

“Hi.”

“Hi.” Patrick’s eyes widen when he sees David. “I’m glad you’re home.” 

David raises an eyebrow. “Okay,” he says, drawing the word out and hoping that doing so would magically transform it into a question. If Patrick needs more help with Tinder, he’s going to have to make himself a drink after, and he really isn’t in the mood for Blue Curaçao. 

“I just—“ Patrick lowers his hand from where it was suspended in the air. He almost reminds David of a puppet, but there are no more strings. 

“Did you want to—“ David gestures behind him into the apartment. “Stevie was sampling some drinks for that trivia night. I can make you one?” 

Patrick shakes his head. 

“Okay,” David says again. He needs Patrick to give him something more to work with. 

And then, miraculously, in a way that David can already tell he’s going to pull out of his memories and play behind his eyelids ad infinitum, Patrick gives him plenty to work with. He leans forward, swaying all of his weight into David’s chest. David hears himself make a noise of surprise that’s really not attractive, but it’s cut off by the press of Patrick’s lips against his own. 

Patrick’s lips are soft, so soft in a way David isn’t prepared for, and he is sure in this, like he is sure in everything. Nothing about Patrick’s kiss is tentative. Patrick’s lips press firmly against David’s and he thinks, _sure_. Patrick’s breath tickles against David’s skin as he sighs, and David thinks, _wholehearted_. Patrick’s tongue teases at the seam of David’s lips and he thinks, _determined_. 

For his part, David is frozen. He’s dreaming, he’s asleep, and if Stevie wakes him up he will never forgive her. 

But then Stevie breaks the moment in a different way, clearing her throat pointedly.

David registers the absence of Patrick’s lips but is afraid to open his eyes, so he doesn’t. Then Stevie clears her throat again, louder, and he blinks once, twice. Patrick is still there, molded to David’s front. His hands grip David’s sweater in a way that definitely is going to stretch the material. David should pull his hands away from the expensive knit, but he just rests his own hands on Patrick’s shoulders instead. Patrick’s lips are bitten red, probably as much from his nerves as David’s ministrations. And he’s looking over David’s shoulder at Stevie, the tips of his ears red but his face lacking any expression of shame. 

“Hi Stevie,” Patrick offers, as though he hasn’t already done a tremendous, brave thing. 

“Hi Patrick.”

“I just came to—“ Patrick turns the full force of those eyes on David. Dangerous. “I wanted to do, um. That.”

He clears his throat, and his eyes dart down to David’s lips and back up. “I really wanted to do that.” 

David can’t talk. He’s never in his life been unable to find words. They’re often the wrong words, but still, normally he has too much to say all the time, so much so that past partners begged him to put a sock in it, or a gag in it, or just leave, maybe. 

Stevie saves him from the situation and also the spiral which he’s teetering on the precipice of. “I’m just going to go finish my drink in my room. With headphones on, or something.” 

David nods. At least he can still do that much. God, what must Patrick be seeing? 

And Patrick is seeing. Patrick is looking at him still, eyes wide and full of something that David doesn’t know how to name. 

“David,” Patrick says, like he’s helpless to say anything else, like it’s easy to say David’s name like it means something to him. “I really wanted to do that.”

David finds his voice. “Thank you,” he says. Like an idiot. 

But Patrick—David finally thinks _gorgeous_ without shaking the thought out of his head, gorgeous Patrick—smiles at him without smiling at him, the corners of his mouth pulling down as his eyes turn fond and molten. 

“You’re welcome.”

David nods. Then he forgets how to stop nodding. 

“David?” Patrick asks, more sure than David expects, but then again it is Patrick after all. “This is...okay, right? Like that’s not a ‘thank you, but please leave me alone and never come back to the bar?’” 

And maybe Patrick isn’t sure. Maybe he’s even braver than David gave him credit for, to come here and kiss David at all, let alone like _that_.

David wants to kiss him again. So, taking his cue from Patrick, who just showed him how to do what he wanted and to know that Patrick wanted it too, he does. He twines his fingers into Patrick’s short hair and takes Patrick’s weight, holding him up even as he wants to melt into him.

“David,” Patrick says, breaking their kiss. His breath comes out in short pants. “I don’t—I don’t want to respond to any heys.”

David feels the smile blooming across his face. The old instinct to twist it up and tuck it away rears its head, but David pushes it down. He wants Patrick to know how happy he makes David. It might even be safe to do so. 

“Thank fuck,” he murmurs, and then he kisses Patrick again.


	6. the roommate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting slightly early! Thanks to [Jess](/users/jessx2231/), [Caite](/users/kindofspecificstore/), and [Sam](https://brighter-than-sunshine.tumblr.com/) for all of their lovely support, edits, and comments throughout the writing process!

David loses himself for who knows how long, standing there in the doorway with Patrick. He could stay here forever, except for how the angle isn’t ideal for his neck, but he’ll be damned if he’s the first one to pull away. 

When Patrick finally does, David is embarrassed at the noise he makes. He’s not going to call it a whine, but that’s more to protect his dignity than because the shoe doesn’t fit. 

Patrick’s smiling at him still. He’s looking at David in a way that David doesn’t have words for. 

David puts that thought to the side. Then he puts the thought of the way he must be looking at Patrick to the side. Somewhere in between those two thoughts, he runs his thumb along Patrick’s cheekbone. It’s hot to the touch, because of course Patrick is warm and lovely. 

“Can we—” Patrick bites his lip. “I don’t want to rush you, and I don’t want to assume, but I kind of don’t want Stevie to walk back in.”

He spares one of his last few thoughts to be wildly grateful that Patrick came here, where David can find everything he needs. Where he has his feet under him.

“Of course we can,” he says. 

Patrick takes the lead and pulls David by the hand to his bedroom. David goes along with it because he can’t think past the roaring in his ears. Heat is licking up his spine, and if old David could see him now he’d probably scoff at how desperate he looks. 

But Patrick isn’t laughing. He’s tugging at David’s sweater, and David magnanimously does not slap his hands away. He’ll learn, he thinks, a little wild and a lot desperate. 

Patrick’s still tugging, because he’s nothing if not determined, and it’s easier to just take the sweater off, maybe. He unbuttons Patrick’s shirt first. It’s only fair.

And screw the tiny voice in the back of his head telling him to play it cool and the instinct to retreat into old David, who can be mean but at least protects himself. New David isn’t aloof no matter what his clothes say. He wears his beating heart on the sleeve of his old Nonchalance sweater, which, hey new David, kind of defeats the point. 

He can’t bring himself to regret any decision that led him to this spot on the pristine duvet of David’s bed, though. Panting, Patrick shrugs his shirt off of his shoulders and presses his chest forward into David at the same time. It looks...athletic. David thinks it’s cute, the way that Patrick wants him. More than cute, even.

“What are the lines here?” David breathes against Patrick’s open mouth. They were kissing a minute ago, but Patrick’s just breathing, open-mouthed, against David’s mouth. “What do you want to do?”

Patrick laughs. It sounds almost manic, so David slows the movement of his hands. He itches to trace up Patrick’s sides and pull Patrick’s full body against him. “David. I just want you.”

David looks up at the ceiling to make the next words come easier. “You’ve got that. Anything more specific?”

“Specifically, I want you to kiss me again.”

PG. David can do PG. He threads a hand through Patrick’s hair, which is just long enough for David to get a grip and tug. At the sound Patrick makes, he tugs again.

Patrick’s lips are hot against his own. Patrick hooks a knee over David’s hip and the decidedly un-PG heat turns David’s head. He feels buzzy. He wants to float above where he and Patrick are twisted together so he can memorize this moment. It’s searing into his brain, and he wants to forget everything unimportant like his birthday and how to maintain his mom’s wigs so he can remember everything about this night.

David’s talking, oh god, he can’t make himself stop talking. “So good, oh my god.” He’s breathing hard, too hard to play it cool by any stretch of the imagination. “Patrick.”

“David.” Patrick drops his head to the crook of David’s neck and bites down. 

David throws his head back and pushes his hips into Patrick’s. “So we’ve established we know each other’s names,” he says. 

“You’re so—” Patrick breathes out against David’s neck, and the hair on the back of his neck stands on end. “Can we—”

“Finish a sentence?” David licks at the shell of Patrick’s ear. “Jury’s still out.”

“How are you—ugh.” Patrick grabs David’s hips, which, okay, and rolls David onto his back. 

This is good for David. He can work with this. But first, he puts his arms on Patrick’s shoulders and stops doing his new favorite thing to talk first. “What are we doing here?”

Patrick nods once, face shifting from turned on to focused but still turned on. “Well, I was hoping this would be a relationship,” he says haltingly. “But if—”

“Patrick. Patrick, no. I mean, not no. Yes. Yes to that.” David puts his hands over his eyes and sighs. Yes to that indeed. “I wanted to know what you’re comfortable with. Tonight. During this.”

“Oh.” Patrick leans in and kisses him again. He pulls back, puts a hand on either side of David’s face, and just looks at him.

David gamely resists the urge to shake off Patrick’s warm, lovely hands or spiral about what Patrick is looking for. 

“David,” Patrick eventually says. “I want to touch you.”

David puts his hands on Patrick’s wrists. “That can be arranged.”

Patrick blinks at him slowly, eyes wide and swimming with something honest. “I’d like to...feel you against me.” He puts a hand on the waistband of David’s underwear. His calloused fingers tease against David’s stomach and leave a trail of sparks in their wake. 

“We can arrange that, too.” David kneels up to rummage through his nightstand for lube. Patrick doesn’t back up, though. He stays right in David’s space, centimeters from David’s lips. So David has to kiss him.

Patrick’s lips are soft against David’s own. He kisses like he teases, somehow both sure and playful. He fakes David out, leaning to the right and then sneaking in on the left when David turns his head to let him in. While David’s reeling from the change of direction—in more ways than one—Patrick pulls his boxer briefs down. Patrick’s own are still on, which is something. David is historically not great at being the most naked person in the room, but Patrick dives in for another fake-out kiss—David is going to need more practice to anticipate this move—and David lets himself be distracted. He fumbles with the cap of the bottle in his hands. He finally gets it open, the picture of grace, and drizzles it inelegantly over himself. 

But he’s doing everything all out of order. “Take those off,” he says. He uses his clean hand to pat at the sleek gray fabric against Patrick’s hip. He can tell that Patrick’s still catching up because he doesn’t take the opportunity to tease David and instead just does what he asks. 

Patrick’s lovely. It’s all David can think about. There’s a faint trail of reddish hair between his navel and dick, but David refuses to let his mouth actually water. 

“Fuck.” He pulls Patrick down on top of him and luxuriates in the delicious, slick friction of their cocks dragging against each other. 

“David.” Patrick says his name like it’s punched out of him. “This, uh, this isn’t going to last long.”

“That’s okay,” David says. It won’t last long for him, either. The slide of Patrick’s length against his own is getting him there embarrassingly quickly.

“At all,” Patrick says, like it’s a confession. Like David could possibly find anything he does less than stunning. “This won’t last long at all.” Patrick’s hand curves around the back of David’s head, tentative and light. 

“Your dirty talk is getting me right in the mood, too.” 

Patrick laughs into David’s mouth, which is a new and frightening experience for him. He’s never had sex that was so fun. It’s been adventurous, or athletic. Dangerous, a few times. But never this fun. 

Patrick keens high in the back of his throat and worries his teeth against the juncture between David’s shoulder and neck. He’s going to have to find a creative sweater solution tomorrow, but every bite is a badge of honor. Patrick finds a gorgeous rhythm. David’s growing closer and closer to the crest of a wave, and the heat of Patrick’s come against his stomach gets him the rest of the way there. Their come mingles on David’s stomach, and Patrick stares at it like it’s a revelation and not something rapidly cooling and sticky.

“Wow,” Patrick says. Then he lets his elbows drop and seals himself against David. 

“This is going to get really uncomfortable really fast,” David warns.

“Wow,” Patrick says again.

David lets him soak in the moment—and probably a few other things. To a point. “Seriously. We’ll be stuck together all night. I have to get up.”

“David.” Patrick tilts his head to meet David’s eyes. “Wow.”

David has spent a lot of time studiously avoiding what he and Patrick could do with each other, and all the ways they could slide and slot together. For all he’s emphatically not built this up in his head, it was rather short. And frankly embarrassing. 

It was also exhilarating. David can’t wait to do it again.

***

"That was..." Patrick doesn't think the right words exist. They'll have to create a new word just for David. Just for how David makes him feel, maybe. 

David clears his throat. He looks like he's lit up from the inside; Patrick thinks it's the most beautiful he's ever been. Patrick just pulled a move straight out of all the rom coms David made him watch to get David to maybe kiss him back before he even knew that David could look like this. If David rewrites how high the bar is again, Patrick thinks he maybe won't survive. 

"That was," David agrees. 

Patrick's cheeks hurt. He's never smiled this much. He thinks of the pictures on the app he's deleting first thing in the morning, and thinks David rewrote another bar there, too. 

"I'm going to—bathroom." David waves a hand behind him and disappears. 

Because he doesn't know how long David will be gone and he might have a scrap of dignity to his name still, Patrick restrains himself from burying his face in David's pillow and kicking his feet in the air. He clenches and unclenches his hands. Too presumptuous to get under the covers? After what they just did, will David want to change the sheets? Patrick shrugs and gets into David’s bed. It'll be good for David to let this happen. One of the ways Patrick can maybe rewrite a few things for David, too. 

The bed's all pushed into a corner; Patrick takes a chance and scoots all the way to the wall. It's his preferred side, but he thinks he'd be willing to negotiate if David's going to be stubborn. 

David comes back in; sadly, he is clothed. Patrick looks at his own boxers and shirt, still in a wrinkled pile by the bedroom door. 

"Oh," David says. 

Patrick looks at his clothes harder, hoping that he's developed some sort of superpower that will transport them onto his body if he stares at them long enough. 

"Is this—" 

David cuts him off, holding up a hand. "It's fine," he says hesitantly. Like he doesn't know how much of Patrick's world is in the room with them. 

"Good," Patrick says. "Pass me my boxers?" 

David does. Then he stands next to the bed. Patrick tamps down the urge to roll his eyes. He senses that it would not go over well. Just a hunch. Instead, he clears his throat and tries to gracefully slide his boxers on while maintaining eye contact with—whatever David is to him now. 

He closes that box. First, he has to get David into bed. 

"Get the light?" He asks, trying to infuse his voice with everything that's tangled up in his chest, whatever it is. 

David does that too, and then walks back over to the bed. Either because it's easier with the lights off or because this is the only bed David has, he sits down on top of the covers. 

Patrick can work with that. He grabs at David's hips, pulling and prodding until David's back is pressed against his chest. 

"This okay?" David asks. As though Patrick hadn't put him in that exact spot less than a second ago. 

Patrick presses his forehead to the back of David's neck. "Of course."

***

The creak of a door startles David, and he drops the pan he’s holding. _Fuck_ , there go the eggs. “We have to put a bell on you or something.”

Stevie snorts.

David turns back to the pan. “There’s a plate of pancakes in the microwave for you.”

Stevie opens the microwave and grabs a fork. She cuts herself a bite and points it at him questioningly. 

"Well? Aren't you going to ask me how it went?" David flicks oil from the pan onto the eggs more forcefully than is strictly necessary.

Stevie shakes her head and widens her eyes. 

"Oh my god, fine! I talked to him! You saw that we kissed! He likes me!" David regulates his volume. If god is merciful, Patrick is still sleeping, blankets tangled around him and heavy limbs wrapped around the pillow David had to put in his arms in order to get out of bed. "He said he likes me, at least. Jury's still out on the rest." 

Stevie nods once. "I am choosing to generously ignore your self-deprecation because you did satisfy my demands. I will talk to you again." 

"Oh, thank god," David says, and he means it as a joke, but he and Stevie both know he's being terrifyingly sincere.

“Details, please.” Stevie takes another bite, but she talks through it. “I think I’m owed that much.”

“I do not kiss and tell.”

Stevie huffs. “I have three years of friendship that directly contradict that statement.”

David bites his lip. Stevie smells the blood in the water, though. 

“Unless,” she says. 

David would throw his hands in the air, but he doesn’t think the eggs would survive. He can’t risk any more casualties. 

“Unless there’s something different about Patrick.”

“Okay,” David says. It’s time to shut all of that down. “Whatever there is, or is not, about Patrick, it’s going to have to wait.”

Stevie takes in the spread David’s curating, the pancakes and bacon and, just in case, cereal. And orange juice. And apple juice, in case Patrick has a preference. 

“He’s still here?” She says. She looks like she did last Christmas, when David got her that record player and Elaine Page album. 

“Yes,” David hisses, “he is still here. And I will give you free drinks all weekend—” At the look on Stevie’s face, David amends his offer. “All week, you can have free drinks _all week_ if you go back to your room right now.”

“I will return to my exile for no less than two weekends.”

David nods and pokes at the eggs. 

“And you have to get groceries. I’ll be surprised if there is a single edible thing left in the fridge after this.”

“Like you would cook even if there were groceries.”

“These are my terms,” Stevie informs him solemnly.

David nods again. “Understood and reluctantly accepted.”

“I’ll bet you are.” Stevie does something truly horrifying with her hands and disappears in a mirage of innuendo.

David shakes his head and plates the eggs. Patrick likes them fried, which is wrong on multiple levels. David’s not even enjoying cooking the way that he’s learned to in the last few years because all of Patrick’s food preferences are incorrect. 

Then he remembers the way that Patrick twined his whole body into him last night, like he wasn’t going to give David a chance to get away. Patrick sleeps like a clinging vine, and David loved the heat and weight of him. He’s going to be a little happy about making the gross food, he guesses. But it’s not about the food.

He surveys the spread and wrinkles his nose. There’s a lot of food here. But Stevie’s no better than a raccoon when it comes to leftovers, so it’s not like any of it will go to waste. And he can admit, if only to himself, that he wants so badly to put that smile, that wide and unselfconscious satisfied smile, on Patrick’s face. This gesture might be more revealing than he’s letting himself think about, but it’s too late for all that now. 

David can always blame Stevie’s appetite, or his own if he gets desperate. But maybe Patrick won’t find it weird. It was so hard to fry eggs like a heathen, so he really hopes that Patrick at least finds it endearing. 

The pancakes are done, and so are the eggs and bacon. That’s basically everything. David sniffs the air. 

Fuck. That’s everything except for the _muffins_ , which he forgot about and left in the oven for too long. 

He turns the oven off, grabs a mitt, and gets the pan out before the smoke alarm can go off. Stevie would never let him live it down, and he can’t imagine what Patrick would say.

Probably nothing mean, he supposes. But that would be worse. Because if the smoke alarm wakes Patrick, David will have to explain all of this while trying to walk the fine line where he’s charmingly endearing and not overeager.

It’s a mercy that the muffins burned, actually, because David feels bad about inflicting banana nut muffins on anyone, even if they don’t know better. Still, David knows that Patrick likes his gross, old-person muffins. That was the one breakfast food David felt confident about, so it’s hard to scrape them into the trash. He buries them under some of the other trash, just in case. In case of what, he’s not sure. He can’t imagine a world where Patrick goes through his kitchen trash. 

But he also couldn’t imagine a world where Patrick kissed him, and look at him now. 

“What’s all this?” Patrick asks. Either that or Stevie’s gotten very good at impressions very quickly.

David stands and turns to face Patrick. He narrowly misses whacking his forehead against the counter. Small mercies. 

“Hi!” David makes sure everything else is off the heat before he grabs for the kettle and puts it on the stove. 

“Hi,” Patrick says. He leans into David’s space and kisses him. 

David is surprised, and then he tries not to feel bad that he’s surprised. Of course Patrick’s kissing him. He kissed him last night. 

“I didn’t know where you were when I got up.” Patrick ducks his head. “I was a little worried you had left.”

“Where would I go?” David asks. But it’s not a ridiculous assumption. He once hid on his own fire escape for four hours while he waited for a date to clear out the morning after. “No, I made breakfast. You know, if you wanted any.”

“Wait, you made all this?” Patrick asks slowly, surprise evident in his voice as he examines the spread. 

“Yes?” David says, more of a question than a statement. 

Patrick catches David’s eye as a slow smile spreads across his face. “So you’re telling me that you got up before eight to make breakfast for us?” 

David’s eyes shift back and forth as he fiddles with the tie on his apron. 

“Yes?” He asks again. 

Patrick doesn’t respond, choosing instead to crowd into David’s space and kiss him soundly. “This is…” 

David grimaces. “A lot.”

“Great,” Patrick emphasizes. “This looks great.”

***

David’s not even eating the cruise ship buffet he’s made. Instead, his eyes are on Patrick. He wipes a napkin across his mouth—just a precaution—and asks what David’s looking at.

“I just,” David shakes his head. “We’re a long way from you inviting my sister on our date.”

Patrick laughs. “That didn’t happen.” He looks at David.

David is not laughing. He’s smiling, kind of awkwardly.

“David.” Patrick’s going to explode. He knows exactly the lunch that David is talking about. Last night was the best night of his life, and he’s going to _die_. “That didn’t happen. That wasn’t a date.”

“I said we should go for dinner, so you could tell me all about what you did before you came to live with Ted and my sister,” David says patiently. “We were going to lunch. I wasn’t the one who invited my sister.”

Patrick refrains from banging his head against the table. He doesn’t want to land in the pancakes. They look too good to destroy.

“Did I break you?” David asks, anxiety bleeding into his voice. 

“I’m just trying to figure out how to kill my past self without harming my current self.”

“Multiverse theory.” David nods. “Normally I save this kind of conversation until lunch.”

“David. I wouldn’t have turned down a date with you.” It’s important to Patrick that David knows that. “There is no universe in which I would have turned down a date with you. Oh my god. I suffered through so many messages on Tinder. I now have to know that patchouli melon candles exist, forever. And I could have avoided it all if I didn’t invite your sister on the date you asked me on.”

It’s only after Patrick finally makes himself stop talking and shoves a piece of bacon into his mouth that he dares to look at David. 

David’s smiling kind of helplessly, like he can’t stop himself. Like Patrick makes him smile even when he doesn’t want to. Kind of like Patrick smiles around David. “Patchouli melon, huh?”

Patrick nods solemnly, then swallows. “I didn’t believe that it was real at first, either.”

David bites his lip and turns his attention back to the french toast in front of him. 

“So,” Patrick says, sensing that they both could do with a change of subject, “how much food did you make, exactly?”

David rolls his eyes. “Hopefully enough to drown out the memory of those candles. Patchouli and _melon_. Honestly.”

***

“You seem like you’re in a good mood. Wendy finally agree to put wine on tap?”

Ronnie’s sitting at the bar again, back for a drink even now, a few weeks after her move. David kind of didn’t think he’d see her again so soon, and he would never say that he missed her. Out loud.

He shakes his head. “She’ll never listen to me about that, sadly.”

“Spill,” Ronnie says. “I’m here for the most expensive free drink I’ve ever had. It’s the least you could do.”

“The least I could do was pay for the drink,” David retorts.

Ronnie tips her glass. “Fair.”

David taps his foot. “Patrick and I are, um. Seeing each other.” It still doesn’t sound real. David keeps waiting for someone to correct him. 

Ronnie nods. “Good for him. You, I expected better from.”

David snorts. 

***

The food is cold. It’s the only thing Patrick can think, sitting in this restaurant that looked much less tacky online. Okay, it’s one of two things he can think, and the other is how beautiful David looks, even in the yellowish light of their booth. 

A third thought pops in, intrusive and all-encompassing and making Patrick wish two thoughts was his full capacity: David must think this is terrible. 

Patrick’s new to this, or new to doing this again, or new to doing this for real. He was with Rachel for so long, and for all that they’d kept hidden about themselves, there was never any question of whether or not they knew each other. Patrick knew how Rachel broke her arm and cracked her left front tooth, and Rachel knew how Patrick wanted to go out for the swim team but didn't have the time if he wanted to start for baseball and how Patrick's curls drove him crazy when they tickled the back of his neck. There was a lot of knowing, was the point. 

And Patrick knows David, or he wants to know David, or he wants to know more about David because even the parts of David that confuse him make him sigh and smile like he's a lovesick teenager, when he's not—he's a lovesick adult, thank you very much.

But the food is cold. It’s their first official date, and the food is cold. Patrick’s so nervous that he can tell he’s absolutely no fun to talk to, which is only making matters worse. David’s smiling gamely at him across the table, and they’re sitting in a booth with cracked vinyl. That’s another thing that Patrick could not have anticipated from the restaurant’s website. 

Patrick is blowing this. 

David’s barely touched his food, so maybe it’s not just cold, it’s bad and cold. But even when the server brought David sparkling water instead of still, and even when Patrick couldn’t make his mouth shut—he’s pretty sure he’s talking about his parents’ garage now—David kept looking at him. Kept smiling at him, soft and small and not hidden away in the corner of his mouth.

Patrick’s sure he looks like he’s contracted some kind of disease in this light. Also, his shirt is too tight, and he’s showing way more of his arms than he’s used to. He keeps fighting the instinct to suck in his stomach. But David looks perfect. Perfect is a strong word for a first date, but Patrick’s not going to take it back. 

“Did you park your car in the garage, too?” David asks.

Patrick blinks himself back into the conversation and out of the depths of David’s eyes, where he’s pretty sure he’s lost a little time. Cars. He can talk about cars, too. 

He launches into a story he’s told so many times he could do it while asleep, about the winter morning when he left his car running to warm up and then stayed home sick. When he woke up the next morning, still nauseous but ready to turn in his French homework, he came outside to an empty tank. 

David nods along and laughs in the right places. Patrick wants to change the story, to show David that he’s interesting. He’s worth keeping around. Even if he can’t pick a restaurant to save his life. 

David spears a piece of pasta with his fork. Patrick told him that the primavera was supposed to be good here, but David’s taken maybe five bites since their plates came. 

Just another thing Patrick’s gotten wrong about the date. Now David’s going to think he likes gross food. Patrick resigns himself to ordering dishes he doesn’t even like every time they go out to dinner. Except they’ll probably never go out to dinner again. Because Patrick is blowing this.

Silence would be even worse than whatever’s coming out of Patrick’s mouth, so he keeps talking. Now he’s telling a story about a road trip with his dad and the first time he changed a tire. This isn’t even a good story. But he’s halfway through it now. It would be worse to stop and change the subject, probably. 

Then David clears his throat. David’s not a patient person, and Patrick knows this. So why has he been testing David’s strength with a boring story that David probably couldn’t care less about for so long?

“Did you want to try some of mine?” David asks, gesturing with one of his large, perfect hands toward his plate. “You said you’d heard about this before you came, right?”

The tips of Patrick’s ears are on fire. Patrick’s on fire. But he nods, because he did say that, and David remembers. David is listening to him. 

“I did say that,” Patrick manages to say past the sound of his heart thudding in his ears. 

David nods and uses his fork to get Patrick a bite, and then—oh. David’s holding the fork out to Patrick. It’s not like this is the first time Patrick’s eaten off of someone’s fork; it’s not even the first time he’s done it on a date. But it’s the first time he’s done it with David. 

He leans forward and does it. He eats off of the fork that David’s holding out to him. David’s gaze is a physical thing. He feels it against his skin. 

David laughs, a short and quiet thing that Patrick wants to hear again immediately, and reaches a finger toward Patrick’s face. Patrick wants to die, he wants the booth to crack in half and make room for the earth to swallow him up, as David wipes away a speck of sauce from the corner of Patrick’s mouth. 

But then. Then. David puts the finger that was just on Patrick’s face—which left its warmth behind, or maybe that’s Patrick’s blush—it in his mouth. 

“Wow,” Patrick says. Maybe David will think he’s talking about the food. 

David wiggles in his seat. Patrick suddenly feels the need to readjust, too. 

“How’s the lasagna?” David asks, nodding at Patrick’s plate.

Patrick’s surprised to see that his food is half-eaten, because he hasn’t tasted a single bite. “Really good.”

David looks like he’s about to laugh at him. He flicks his eyes down to Patrick’s plate and then slowly back up to meet Patrick’s gaze. Patrick gets with the program.

“Would you—” Patrick clears his throat. “Do you want a bite?” 

David nods, magnanimous. 

Patrick drags his fork through the sauce on his plate, trying to craft the perfect bite of his middling lasagna for David, then he holds the fork out. And then David casually rearranges the world around Patrick again. He eats off of Patrick’s fork, eyes closing as he tastes the food.

That’s...something. Patrick wants to save the sound David makes, that pleased little hum, forever. Except David can never make it again, or Patrick will embarrass himself even further. 

There’s something wet on Patrick’s forehead. He refuses to believe it’s sweat. If it’s sweat, then David can see it, and if David can see it, Patrick might die. How long has his forehead been sweaty? David is going to think he’s dewy, even though David knows Patrick, and knows that Patrick is not, generally speaking, a dewy person. Patrick's skin is probably all pink, too. Patrick can just imagine, David looking ethereal even in the sickly yellow light and Patrick looking like he just finished running ten miles, sweaty and splotchy. 

Patrick judges that it’s safe to stand up without risking public embarrassment, and makes a vague noise about the bathroom. He doesn’t meet David’s eyes. 

Standing over the sink in the bathroom, Patrick debates whether he can give himself a pep talk, or if it’s a lost cause. He debates calling Stevie, but decides he has enough on his plate, metaphorically speaking, without adding her laughter. 

“You know David,” he mutters to himself. He hasn’t checked the stalls for feet, so he can’t risk speaking much louder. _You’re already dating_ , he adds in his head. _And if he doesn’t like the food, you know he likes ice cream._ Nodding now that he has an action plan, or something that resembles one if he squints, he washes his hands again—they’re sweaty, except they aren’t sweaty because that would be embarrassing—and goes back to their table. 

He feels like his skin will hold him together better now. A look at David’s plate supports that feeling. David’s taken more than five bites. At least ten, he thinks as a bone-deep certainty that David would hate the attention Patrick’s paying to his food intake also washes over him.

Batting all of that aside, Patrick sets his hand on the table, face-up. He starts his mental timer as David talks about Wendy’s latest idea. Something about a karaoke machine. He’ll give it one minute, and if David’s not interested Patrick can wipe it against his pant leg or grab the dessert menu or something. It won’t be any more awkward than Patrick’s already been.

“And of course, it’s not just horrifically off-brand. I’m pretty sure it would cause my skin to actually break out in embarrassment hives,” David adds. 

But what if David thinks Patrick is just resting his hand there? Before he can overthink, or just think it through like he usually does, he jerks his hand into David's. And the corners of David’s eyes crinkle up when he smiles. 

But then David’s hand is moving. Oh god, Patrick is a disaster. This is the hand David’s holding his fork with. He makes a move to pull his hand away, and David's eyes crinkle when he smiles. He's beautiful. And David says he was done anyway and keeps holding Patrick's hand. He's _holding Patrick's hand_. 

Maybe Patrick isn't blowing this, after all.

Except his hand was sweaty, and is sweaty still. Now that he’s thinking about it, he can feel it getting more sweaty. He pulls it away to gesture with and wipe surreptitiously on his pant leg and then slides it back into David's, probably too quickly. And David just smiles at him. David almost certainly knows what he's doing, but Patrick's okay with that.

David holds firm the next time Patrick tries to pull it back. Patrick shoots a terrified look at their hands and at the sweat stains on his pant leg from last time, and then looks up at David's eyes. 

"Hey," David says softly. He squeezes Patrick's damp hand, once. "I'm having a good time." 

Patrick lets out a breath. "Me too," he says. His voice is a little warbly, a little soft. A lot infatuated. "I'm sorry the food was cold." 

David waves his free hand. "It had to be this air vent we're under, and honestly? I'm happy we're in this booth. It's kind of warm in here." 

Patrick unspools, tension loosening in his shoulders, his forehead, his mouth. "I wanted this date to be good," Patrick says, like it's a secret, like David doesn't already know. "I wanted—it—to be good for you." 

The force of David’s gaze is enough to undo him, to tear him into his component parts and scatter him around this mid-level chain restaurant. 

"Patrick," David says, "you know I'm, like, a sure thing, right?" 

Patrick tilts his head. 

"I just mean that I'm already," David swallows. "I already like you. I like this, what we're doing. I'm—impressed. By you." 

"I like it, too," Patrick breathes.

David doesn’t let go of his hand for hours. They skip the ice cream, but they take the long, long way back to David’s apartment. And the whole time, David holds Patrick’s sweaty hand. 

And then they’re in David’s bed, and David rests his head on Patrick’s stomach and catches his breath. They spent nearly an hour practicing their stamina just like David promised they would after that first night, and Patrick thinks it’s a miracle that he’s still alive. His throat is raw from yelling and the rest of his skin feels tight and new. Like he’s been completely remade by David’s hands.

"Patrick, we've already kissed. You already stayed over. The same night we kissed, in fact. This was a date, sure," there's laughter in David’s voice, "but you had to know you already had my attention." 

Patrick files away "my attention" because he wants David's eyes on him and hands on him and mouth on him all the time but first he has to answer David's question. 

"No, I know," Patrick says. "It's just. This was different." 

David hums. "You were still Patrick."

***

Patrick wakes up to Alexis poking his shoulder. 

“What happened? D’the fire alarm go?” Patrick asks. He rubs a hand over his eyes before he opens them. 

“No, Patrick. But I need help with this accounting assignment.” 

Patrick groans and rolls over. “Five minutes.” 

Alexis pokes his shoulder again what feels like seconds later. 

“There’s no way it’s been five minutes.” 

“But I _really_ don’t get it, Patrick.” 

“Fine,” Patrick says. “Fine fine fine.” 

Alexis pats his head. “I made you tea. Go shower or brush your teeth or something.” 

Patrick does what Alexis wants, because she says it in a way that just makes sense. When he comes back into the room, the light is on and Alexis is at her desk. 

“Did you know that you make, like, a whistling noise with your nose?” she asks. 

Patrick bumps her shoulder with his and grabs the book. “What’s giving you problems?”

***

Stevie drops her bag by the door and doesn’t even bother to hang it up before she hunts David down in the kitchen. He wordlessly nudges a plate of cheese and crackers toward her. 

“Have you eaten?” He asks.

“Have you?” 

He shakes his head and gestures toward the plate. “We can call this dinner. I just got back from that accounting firm’s party about an hour ago.”

"And how were the drinks?” Stevie kicks off her shoes and sighs. They had campus interviews today for local jobs, and she texted David earlier that she never wants to see her blazer again. “Which of the five did you end up featuring?" 

"The pineapple one." 

Stevie sighs. “That was my favorite one.”

David stands up and crosses to the fridge. His feet went numb about four hours ago, so he doesn’t even feel the pain anymore. He pulls out the drink that he saved for her, clinks his glass of water against it, and slides it across the counter to her. 

"Thought you deserved at least this for putting up with me all week. I know I was a mess." 

And Stevie takes a sip. "Do I get a drink every time I put up with you?" She asks innocently. "Because I am many, many drinks behind what I am owed if that's the case."

***

When Patrick heads to David’s apartment, he brings David a pint of rainbow sherbet. 

Stevie laughs at him for at least five minutes. “I hate to have to tell you this, Patrick, but that's not real ice cream.” She shakes her head at him, grabs her bag, and leaves. It’s nearing finals, and it’s her last semester. If she has to live in the library for a few weeks to get her diploma, then so be it. 

David grabs two spoons and settles on the couch. Patrick slumps into him, exhausted. He’s really hating the project he’s on, and even though David doesn’t understand what he does still, no matter how patiently or often Patrick explains it, he’s very good about letting Patrick complain.

But David’s attention is still on the ice cream. “I don't think I've ever mentioned this,” he says. 

Patrick nods. "That's true. But when you were testing all of those drinks for that trivia night, it seemed like you liked the one with the orange sherbet, so this felt like a safe bet." 

And David holds out a spoon for Patrick. 

"No thanks," Patrick says, grimacing. "If you'll recall, I told you that the sherbet drink tasted like sugar and nostalgia and nothing else." 

David scoffs. "I assumed that was a compliment, not a complaint."

Patrick laughs while David just kind of looks at him. 

“What?” Patrick asks, running a hand through his hair. 

David shakes his head. “Nothing.” 

“Looked like it was more than nothing.” Patrick hooks his arm through David’s. “Did I get some of my grown-up ice cream on my face?” 

“Nope.” 

Patrick doesn’t think David will willingly say more, but he kind of needs to hear more. “It had to be something.” 

David shakes his head again, like he’s helpless to do anything else. “Just memorizing.” 

Patrick laughs. “I’ll still look like this tomorrow.” 

David nods, fast. Too fast. “No, I know.”

***

Patrick’s eating a cherry. There are many reasons David should not have given it to him. Most of them are about the frankly obscene way Patrick’s mouth looks right now, but the one that David’s sticking to is Patrick should not be rewarded for the cookie cake he sent David for their one-month anniversary. Stevie laughed at him for an hour straight and ate half of it before he even got home. Patrick didn’t even order a drink with a cherry. David just dropped a few in a glass and handed them over when Patrick asked. It’s a feeling he’s growing used to when it comes to Patrick, that sense of being helpless to do anything but exactly what he asks for. 

“Hope they’re good,” David says, trying to distract himself from Patrick’s tongue. “Because I charge eight dollars a cherry.”

“Do I get a discount, now that we’re dating?” 

“I already give you more of a discount than I have ever given a—person I’m dating.” David doesn’t know who said that, but Patrick’s looking at him. “It’s your choice if you want this to affect your pricing.”

It’s maybe too dim to tell for sure, but Patrick’s skin is flushed. Maybe it’s time to cut him off. “How long until my drinks cost the same as Stevie's?”

“When I start using the cheap vodka for you. I thought you had taste, though.”

"David.” Patrick’s enjoying this, the monster. “When do I get the same discount as Stevie?" 

"When it's your turn to yell at me about towels and morning routines," David says, almost unthinkingly. Fast enough that he can't pass it off as a joke. Fuck.

He's afraid to look at Patrick, but when he finally resigns himself to whatever he might find and meets his gaze, he doesn't know why he was nervous. A grin is spreading across Patrick's face, slow like honey, growing and stretching and bunching up his cheeks. 

"So," Patrick's voice is like honey too, sticky and sweet. "You think we're going to live together?" 

David tries not to wince. Patrick is teasing. Patrick always teases. He shouldn't take it so seriously. 

"I'm just saying, she puts up with a lot more of me than you do at the moment." David busies his hands, cutting the peel off of an orange methodically. If he has to focus exclusively on his hands and can't meet Patrick's gaze, well. It's better than cutting off a finger. 

"David?" Patrick says. 

"Hmm." 

"I think we'll fight a lot less about morning routines." 

David peeks up. Patrick's smiling at him still, crinkles around his eyes like he means it. 

"You know. When we live together." 

David turns his attention back to the orange. "Okay." It's too soft, too real. Not as joking as he was hoping it would come across. But that's okay. He thinks Patrick will let it slide.

“David.” Patrick’s using his no-nonsense voice, which doesn’t make many appearances outside of the bedroom. “I don’t want to stay on your sister’s futon forever.”

“Obviously.” How Patrick’s back doesn’t pop like bubble wrap every day, David will never know.

“And I like my job fine,” Patrick pushes on, “but I don’t want to do it forever.”

David braces himself. _And you know this was just fun_ , he fills in in his head. _It was never meant to be long-term._ He’s heard this spiel before. Minus the part about living with his sister.

“There’s not a lot about my life here that I want to do forever.” Patrick’s still talking. If David could unglue his jaw from where it’s locked in place, he could stop himself from having to hear the familiar words again. David has a sneaking suspicion that they’ll sting more coming from Patrick, but he doesn’t examine it too closely yet. He does his best overthinking with a mall pretzel in hand and Bridget Jones narrating his spiral. 

But David can’t deny himself a single second in Patrick’s presence, even if he’s about to be broken up with. So he doesn’t interrupt Patrick. “I like my friends,” Patrick says. “Talking more to my parents. And you.”

“Me?” 

“You, David.” Patrick is talking the same way he did when he and David talked logistics for visiting Marcy and Clint. Like there are logical steps—departure times and sharing a suitcase—that they need to talk through, but there’s no question that the trip will happen. Patrick doesn’t have a question about David, apparently. It’s soothing and terrifying in equal measure. “You’re something I want to—”

“Do forever?” David reaches for the teasing with both hands. The knowledge that Patrick wants him, not for now and not for a while but forever, settles around him. 

“Among other things.” Patrick pokes his hip, then soothes the spot with a gentle touch. “We’ll have to stop sometimes. Food and work.”

“Details, details.”

Later that night, after Patrick’s had four more cherries and almost choked on the stem of a fifth when he tried to tie it into a knot in his mouth, Patrick taps below the hem of David’s sweater until David raises his arms for Patrick to pull it off, because they’re _compromising_ about how to treat David’s clothes. Patrick folds the sweater neatly, because he’s superhuman, and David rewards him by licking into his mouth and knocking him back onto his bed. 

Patrick exhales when he lands and reaches his arms up toward David, opening and closing his hands. “Come here. You have to come here.”

“I’m here,” David says. He does his best to be reassuring, but mostly he’s just parroting Patrick because coming up with his own words seems impossible. He’s paid a lot of attention to Patrick’s mouth today, but he’s still mesmerized. His thumb catches on the bow of Patrick’s lips. Then he has to follow his finger with his own lips. Patrick tastes like cherries, which drives David wild. He pulls Patrick deeper into his arms and hooks a leg over his hip. 

“Good,” Patrick says. He kisses down David’s neck—that _mouth_ , honestly—and mumbles something into David’s ribs that sounds like _stay_.

“God,” David gasps. “Patrick. You’re going to kill me.”

“What a way to go.” Patrick pulls David’s joggers and briefs off in one motion and then reaches up to bring David’s mouth to his. 

David doesn’t really bend this way, but Patrick makes a convincing argument. “You don’t even know. You’re so—”

Patrick reaches for the lube while David’s babbling away, and he ghosts a finger over David’s rim. 

The feel of the rough pad of Patrick’s finger is electric. There should be actual, physical sparks between them, but David can’t see them. He still feels them, though. When Patrick crooks his finger, David throws his head back. He’s always loved this, but it’s never felt like it does with Patrick. 

“I can’t believe—” David would finish his thought, but Patrick’s chasing every word out of his head. 

“You can’t believe what? I’m dying to hear the end of that sentence.” Patrick sounds infuriatingly present. 

David sticks a hand between them to grab at Patrick’s cock. Patrick’s groan sounds like it’s punched out of him, which is gratifying to say the least. 

Patrick’s competitive though, a thing that David would remember if he could think of anything but Patrick’s name. His thumb keeps teasing against David’s rim, and he licks into David’s mouth. 

“Fuck,” David breathes. “You have to—"

“One step ahead of you.” Patrick grabs for a condom and slides it on.

David makes a frankly embarrassing sound as Patrick slides in while licking at that spot behind his ear that makes David’s eyes roll back in his head. 

“I know,” Patrick says, steady and sure. “I know. _David._ ” He finds their practiced rhythm and lifts a hand to press one of David’s wrists into the mattress. He keeps his balance with the other hand, bracing it against the headboard. 

Before David can reach down to his cock and pump himself—he loves few things more than the feeling of coming at the same time Patrick does inside of him—he’s already coming. Patrick’s breath is hot and wet against David’s ear and his whole body is soft and smooth against David’s own. 

The lights in the room are too bright when David first blinks. Patrick thrusts once, twice more and then slumps against David, lips finding David’s automatically as they both try to catch their breath. 

There’s something wet on David’s face that he’s not going to examine too closely. “You’re getting pretty good at that,” he muses, just to be a dick. And partially to distract Patrick from that wet thing.

“I don’t know.” Patrick’s eyes crinkle with something joyful. David wants to drown in them. “Might need more practice.”

“Oh, practice,” David says. “I dated a tantric yoga instructor once, but our practice actually wasn’t that fun. Too acrobatic, and yoga pants are decidedly the best part of yoga.”

Patrick’s mouth—that gorgeous mouth, the one that started all of this—curves into a smile. “I could write sonnets about your pillow talk.” 

***

“You have to help me,” Alexis says, and something desperate behind her eyes makes Patrick close his laptop, where he’d been fiddling with songs for David’s playlist. It’s just something he’d been doing in his spare time, or whenever a lyric got stuck in his head. It’s already pretty long, and he and David don’t go on many long drives together. Maybe when they visit his parents in a few weeks. His mom has been a mess of cleaning and batch cocktail recipes since they finalized the dates. She wants so badly to impress David, and it’s endearing for the most part. 

“With what?” He asks. 

“With David,” Alexis says, widening her eyes meaningfully and flopping onto the couch. Patrick had never seen Alexis flop before. “If my mom doesn’t kill him for missing this year’s Christmas party, _I_ will for how much he’s making me hear about it. The only person I like talking about this much is Chrissy Teigen.” She paused. “Unless talking about myself counts. Or Ted, I guess.”

Patrick lets himself be pulled along for the ride. “The Christmas party?”

“Yes, Patrick, the Christmas party. I, at least, will be fulfilling my duties to our parents and not _ruining_ Christmas like a miserable Grinch on Christmas Eve.”

“Your mom was asking you not to ruin Christmas?”

“She’s asking me to ask David to come. I feel like we’re in middle school again. Or like I’m at an Olsen twins party.”

“So David’s the one ruining Christmas.” Patrick is more lost than usual. 

“My mom was, like, scary upset that she had to perform The Number alone last year when David didn’t come. I’ve never seen her upset about performing a solo before. It felt weird.”

“And David normally—”

“Yes, Patrick. David’s been doing The Number with mom since he could stand, basically. And he didn’t even come to the party last year. It sucked. He should come this time.”

"And you have to go alone?" He asks innocently. 

"No," Alexis says, begrudging. "Ted goes with me. But he doesn't let me control the music. And he never helps me pick out an outfit." 

Patrick nods. "Doesn't seem like that would be a strength of his." 

Patrick's seen the man's attempts at fashion; David had talked loudly and unfavorably about Ted's newest lime green sweater (because he now owned more than one), but, thankfully, he had only done so out of Ted's earshot. 

"No," Alexis says. "It is not a strength of his. And when I tried to get Ted to swipe me snacks from the kitchen last year, he just said we should wait for them to be brought out like everyone else." 

Her face tells Patrick how ridiculous she finds that suggestion.

“And you can’t ask him yourself?” Patrick asks.

“He said no last time.”

“I’ll talk to him.” Patrick says. “No promises.”

“Not even, like, a little promise? That he’ll show up for just an hour or three?”

***

“Your hat isn’t straight.”

“David, get your hands away from my head or I swear to god—”

“Fine!” David holds up his hands. “Let your mortarboard be crooked in all your pictures. I wash my hands of you.”

“Wise.” Stevie nods. 

“Stevie!” Alexis swans over, Ted in tow. “Babe, your weird hat is sitting funny.” 

David watches, outraged, as Alexis straightens it.

“Looks great,” Patrick supplies. “Good catch, Alexis.” 

David aims an elbow at his stomach, but Patrick wraps his arms around David’s waist and hooks his chin over David’s shoulder before the jab can land. 

And when Stevie crosses the stage to get her diploma, Ted sniffles. Patrick looks at David, who’s sitting next to Ted, but David’s crying, too. He decides to lean into it and stands up to clap.

In unison, Alexis and David each grab an arm and pull him down.

“Oh my god,” David says.

Alexis groans. “Such a dork.”

But then David squeezes his upper arm, and that’s pretty great. He’s pretty sure his arm is still tingling.

They all catch up with Stevie after.

“This is such a good look for you,” Alexis says. 

Stevie snorts. “It's a shapeless mass of fabric.”

“No.” Alexis widens her eyes. “Your face. That's a good look.”

Patrick thinks that Stevie’s smile could power the entire city that night. 

***

David barely has a second to brace himself before Stevie barrels into him and knocks him over.

“I’m sorry,” he wheezes from where he lands on his bedroom floor. “I know the graduation flowers were corny.”

And the note he tucked between the blossoms was even more revealing. He gritted his teeth to get through writing those heartfelt words, and he probably deserves death for forcing sincerity on Stevie.

Stevie just sighs. She’s still wearing her cap and gown, and David has to duck to avoid a corner of the mortarboard poking him in the eye. “This is a hug, David.”

***

“I’m not sure if we’ll have anything here that you’d like, but can I get you a drink?”

Patrick’s mom—Marcy, she said to call her Marcy—is trying so hard. David wants to make this easier for her and Patrick’s dad. And a little bit for Patrick, too. He’s been wringing his hands together in his lap since they all sat down after dinner. They’re all circled around a board game, and he actually thinks he might not be the most nervous person in the room. Anymore. His hands shook from the moment they left Toronto until they pulled into Patrick’s driveway. 

But now he’s on a mission. He still has to get revenge on Patrick for cutting off his routes thrice the last time they played. Even though Patrick tried to get back in his good graces by driving all the way here while David slept in the backseat, David’s not quite ready to forgive.

“Do you have any hard seltzer?” He asks. 

“Of course,” Marcy says. She laughs, clearly nervous. “And when I get back, we can pick colors.”

“David will want to be black,” Patrick says.

Clint raises his eyebrows. “No one’s going to fight you for that.”

“Are we playing, then?” Marcy asks once she comes back and hands off the can to David.

“Only if I can be on your team.” Something flops in David’s stomach. He’s pretty sure this isn’t going too badly. “I have a bone to pick with your son, and I’m told you’re better than him at this game.”

Marcy nods, fast. “Of course.”

“Unfair,” Patrick complains. “How come you two get to team up while I’m playing solo?”

“You can always team up with your dad.” Marcy doesn’t even look up from where she’s shuffling route cards. 

Clint shrugs. “Fine by me.”

“No, that’s okay.” Patrick scoots his chair away from his dad.

“Wait a minute,” Clint takes off his glasses. “You don’t want to be on my team?”

Patrick puts his head in his hands. “You only ever go from Boston to Los Angeles. You’ll never make it!”

David hums. “I played with someone who did that once.”

“Really?” Marcy asks.

“Wendy’s date. We had four people for a games night and I invited her and Apollo once to make it an even six. Only once.”

“Have I ever met Apollo?” Patrick thinks he would remember that name.

“I only ever met him the one time,” David says. “He was maybe an escort and he perhaps also worked at Cinnabon. We never did nail down the details.”

Marcy tilts her head. David’s seen that look before. He turns to the original culprit, and Patrick picks up his hand and presses a kiss to the palm. 

David’s no stranger to PDA, or exhibitionism. Once, his date left an Instagram Live running for a shockingly long time before David clocked the phone camera. But it’s this gesture that makes him feel exposed. 

“I’m going to grab myself something.” Patrick picks up David’s can and shakes it. “Need another?”

David nods and thinks that Patrick’s sweet until he realizes that his boyfriend jumping up like he’s on a mission for the fate of the universe and not just a can of hard seltzer leaves him alone with Patrick’s parents. 

“So,” he says, voice high. “What embarrassing stories can we fit in before he gets back?” 

***

Patrick presses his forehead against the wall next to the kitchen and listens to his dad’s laughter and the way it mixes with David’s. Two of his favorite sounds. He could pick both of them out of any group. And he never imagined how lovely they would sound together. 

It’s weird to be back here, he thinks. He thought David would overwrite his old memories and wash them away, but that hasn’t happened so far. 

Instead, the first memories play next to the new ones like the world’s easiest game of spot the difference. Patrick thinks he maybe doesn’t have to look past the smile on his face now and the way it reaches all the way up to his eyes and emanates out from him like he’s a cartoon character, or something. It’s like looking at himself from outside himself. 

Earlier that day, when David hooked his chin over Patrick’s shoulder and asked Patrick to tell him about the auditorium in his high school that his mom used her classroom keys to open for them, Patrick wanted to show David both pictures, the then and the now. 

He wants David to see clearly, so absolutely surely, how much better everything is when David’s with him. He thinks that maybe if David could see the before, he’d feel more secure as Patrick’s after.

He can’t even bring himself to be upset later that night when his mom brings out the home videos. 

Until she plays the _Risky Business_ one. They had an arrangement about that one. 

He watches through his fingers as his dad puts a band-aid on his bruised knee and wipes the tears off of his face. And he buries his head in David’s neck and covers his ears when he throws his tantrum about his mom missing the music cue. David’s shoulder shakes with the force of his laughter, and Patrick wants to melt into the floor. 

“I had no idea that you were such an _artiste_ ,” David says. 

His dad laughs. “And this was after an hour of rehearsal with me. Imagine what it was like on the first go-around.”

David’s hand finds Patrick’s and squeezes. Patrick breathes and squeezes back. 

“How much do I have to pay you to recreate these videos?” David asks that night. 

“You can’t afford my rates.”

“Kinky.”

Patrick hits at David’s chest, but it turns into pawing at him. He sighs as David presses him up against the door of his bedroom.

But the sound of his mom warbling the words to “Danger Zone” through the door breaks the mood. 

Patrick lets his head fall back into the door. “That’s not even the right movie.”

***

David groans when he hears the knock on the door. He had the day off and specifically planned to marathon Meg Ryan movies and eat an entire pizza, and this is throwing a wrench into his schedule. 

“What are you doing here? I specifically had plans not to see people today.”

“David, let me in.” There’s a bag slung over Alexis’s shoulder, and she’s holding a box of his favorite microwave popcorn out like an offering. 

“Did you offend me somehow?” He asks. “Because I don’t know what this is for.”

“Ugh, sit down, David.” Alexis grabs his popcorn bowl and puts a package in the microwave. “Wait. First, go put on better movie-watching clothes. Yours look uncomfortable. And bring me a sweater.”

“This is my apartment.” David feels obligated to protest.

At Alexis’s look, he turns to do what she said. 

When he comes back, he stops and grabs the back of the couch. She’s pulled up _Pretty in Pink_. 

Alexis looks up at the noise he makes. “Good, you’re back.” She holds out a hand for her sweater. “I’m still finishing this. I can’t believe you put sour gummy worms in here. Seriously, David, it tastes radioactive.”

“What is this about?” David wracks his brain for any wrongs he’s complained to Alexis about, but he comes up empty. 

Still, she’s doctored up a bowl exactly the way he likes, even though she can't stand mini marshmallows anymore. 

“No talking during the movie. It’s your rule, David. The least you can do is follow it.”

David sits gingerly on the couch next to his sister and lets her hold the bowl. He can feel her heat against his side, and he leans into it. She's there. She made him popcorn. The screen is blurry. 

David barely watches the movie because wow, it did not age well, but he's smiling for the rest of the night.


	7. amaretto sour

David flicks his attention from the traffic in front of him to Patrick. They’re all piled into Patrick’s car, but Patrick handed him the keys, citing his wariness of city driving. So Patrick’s sitting in the passenger seat and David’s trying not to combust from the weight of Patrick’s attention where Alexis and Ted can see him. 

He feels the need to warn Patrick, to tell him he still has time to run, bubbling up. There’s a reason he’s never brought a date to the Christmas parties before.

"This might be a lot," David says quietly. He uses _a lot_ the way other people might say _a problem_ , the way his old partners said his name. 

"A lot how?" Patrick asks. 

David can see Alexis rolling her eyes in the rearview mirror. 

"Ugh, don't listen to him, Patrick," she says. "I mean, I guess you should. They kind of are a lot. But also, they're not that bad." 

Ted laughs. "Your mom called you twelve times yesterday," he reminds Alexis. 

David tilts his head. That's pretty restrained for the day before a performance. He pushes down the old habit of calling to run through the lyrics on the drive over. There are other people in the car. And besides, he's not doing The Number. He has made his position on that very clear. Even if his mom added "Oh Hanukkah" to the last arrangement she emailed him. That was bribery and he would not be swayed by it. Plus, the attached choreography would probably make him pull a muscle, and he refuses to do that in front of a crowd again.

"I'm just saying," he says. "They can be a lot if you're not prepared. Look at Ted." 

Patrick does. Ted does a dorky little wave. 

"Ted was trapped in my mom's wig room for three hours the night he first met our parents," David continues.

"That is unfair, David," Alexis puts a hand on Ted’s shoulder. "Ted got lost on his way to the bathroom." 

"Well, to be fair, your mom did lock me in there after the first hour. She wouldn't let me out until I appreciated the essence of her hairpieces. And until she could determine that I wasn’t making off with any of the wigs."

Patrick laughs. Clearly, he has not grasped the stakes of the situation. 

“It’s temperature controlled,” Ted says, “with its own thermostat. Password protected.”

Patrick seems to be taking all of this more seriously now. Thank god for Ted. 

“And I thought Alexis was using her hostage negotiation experience to get me out the whole time, but instead—”

“Oh my god,” Alexis huffs. “I told you I went into the kitchen for, like, five minutes. The chef made these little eclairs, Patrick, you would not _believe_.”

It looks like there are a few things about this story that Patrick cannot believe. 

“Seriously.” Ted is talking again, which has mixed results for David a lot of the time. “These guys,” Ted gestures toward his chest. “They could've cut glass by the time I got out of there. If you know what I mean.”

“Ew,” Alexis says, so David doesn’t have to. “Yes, Ted. We all know what you mean.”

***

"Tell her you like the wig," Ted whispers, except it's Ted so Alexis also hears him. 

"Oh yes, Patrick." She nods. Patrick can't make sense of this family. 

Moira Rose is even more of a contradiction in person than she was on the television his dad turned on religiously for years to catch up with the drama of the _Sunrise Bay_ hospital and attached enchanted cave. She had breezed into the entry and fluttered her hands at both David and Alexis, then swept into the kitchen to check on the food. David and Alexis trailed after her, and Ted and Patrick trailed after them. Now, they’re all watching Moira look over plates with a critical eye—the same eye she used on Patrick. David’s palming tiny pastries and passing some to Alexis, all without breaking the conversation about choreography and artistic license Moira’s launched into. 

"I should tell her that I know she's wearing a wig?" He asks. 

Ted nods. "And compliment it. Tell her it sets off the gold of her dress." 

"And you're not doing this to get back at me for doing kitchen s’mores with Alexis again?" He checks. 

"This is the first I'm hearing of that," Ted sighs. "I might have kept that very specific compliment for my own use if I had known. To _cap_ off the night." 

Sufficiently sure that Ted is not sabotaging him—multiple board game nights have taught Patrick that Ted is a puppy, but one with a few idiosyncrasies, like viciousness during Monopoly—Patrick does as Ted told him. And Moira puts a hand on his arm. He thinks that's progress. 

Of course, then she sweeps away, David caught in both her wake and her firm grip to help spot her while she rehearses. 

Patrick would save him, but Alexis puts a hand out when he takes a step toward the staircase past which the two of them have disappeared. 

"I think they just need a minute," she says.

They don’t come back downstairs until the party’s in full swing. Alexis is in the middle of a story about when David fell off of the chair his mom made him stand on during The Number until he hit his growth spurt when he was seven. Patrick’s laughing so hard that he’s crying when he feels David’s arms wrap around his shaking shoulders from behind. 

“I don’t know why you’re laughing at my showmanship,” he murmurs. “My mom trained me well. I didn’t even start crying until I got the chef to take me outside after we finished.”

Patrick wants to keep laughing at David. He also wants to hug him. And push him up against a wall and kiss him until he forgets his name. It’s a complicated sentiment.

“And Mom was so proud of you,” Alexis says. “Didn’t she even sign your cast?”

David nods, Patrick’s pretty sure, even if he can’t see it. “She told me that I should take it as the highest of compliments, because she was historically quite reticent to bestow her nomenclature upon the goods of fans.”

“That’s...sweet?” Ted says.

“And she gave you that bracelet, too.” Alexis twines her hand in Ted’s arm. “Your first trinket from your adoring public.”

“Less than I deserved.” David sniffed. “She only let me pick from her fifth-best jewelry box.”

Patrick grabs one of David’s hands and tugs until he’s standing next to David and can see the smile on his face. He likes to be able to see it. 

Ted and Alexis wander off, looking for cookies. Alexis winks at Patrick. “We might even go stand by the door where they bring the food out.”

“I can’t picture you here,” Patrick says, looking around the room. It’s expansive and decorated to the hilt, but of course his eyes stay trained on David despite the distractions of the twinkling lights and neverending stream of canapé trays. 

David tilts his head. “I mean, I _am_ here. It should be pretty easy to picture.”

Patrick presses his lips together. David chattered nervously for the entire car ride to his parents’ Toronto place. Understandable, Patrick thinks, since it’s his first time back in this world since he left almost two years earlier. Now that they’re here, his boyfriend’s (boyfriend’s!) hackles are up. 

“I’ve just gotten used to you in the bar, and in your place, and in my room, I guess.” Patrick isn’t coming across as clearly as he wants to. “This place doesn’t really feel like you.”

David’s eyes narrow. _Clarify_ , Patrick thinks. 

“Guess I just need to get used to you like this, too.”

David’s still looking at him suspiciously, but his gaze does soften. 

Patrick clears his throat and decides to change the subject. “Is there a place we can get a drink?”

David nods. “The best way to get through this night is by being as tipsy as possible without embarrassing yourself,” he informs Patrick gravely. 

“Dark.”

“It’s a fine line.” David nods. “Though normally I’d be performing with my mom, so I’d be three sheets to the wind beforehand so the embarrassment didn’t do me in.”

Patrick heard tell of this performance. Alexis tried to tease David while they were squeezed into his slightly-too-small car on the drive over. David had shut her down pretty quickly, eyes flicking over to Patrick nervously as though there could be anything about David that would make Patrick like him less. 

The bar, when David finds it, is beautiful and ornate and well-stocked to an ostentatious degree. It’s also unattended. David taps his fingers against the counter once, then shrugs and moves behind the bar. 

“What do you want?” He asks, reaching for a glass. 

Patrick wants to kiss him, right here. In front of everyone, all of the partygoers who David either knows or is expected to know. “Surprise me,” he says.

“But you’re already meeting my parents tonight.” David wrinkles his nose. “That’s got to be the surprise limit. My mom alone probably surpassed your expectations in the first five minutes.”

Patrick knows the feeling. David does that to him every day. “I think I can trust your taste by now.”

Patrick’s eyes are trained on David’s hands, familiar motions in an unfamiliar place. They wrap around and tip bottles, then grab a stir stick and ice. Then David pushes a glass across the bar but stays behind it. He taps his glass against the one he just put in front of Patrick, then tips it back.

“I haven’t had one of these in a while,” he says. “But it used to be my favorite.”

Well now Patrick has to try it. Anything that David loved is something he wants to understand. It’s kind of sweet, like everything David likes. Kind of acidic. Sharp, but still balanced. He leans across the bar and catches David’s lips. The drink tastes better there.

David pulls away when someone clears their throat next to Patrick. He blanches, mouth pressing into a line.

“David?” A woman is squinting at him. “Is that you?”

“Hi.” His voice is a little breathy. Patrick wants to take the credit for that, but he doesn’t think it belongs to him. 

“Are you—” The woman looks at where David’s standing. There’s something like pity around her mouth, and Patrick can’t let that stand.

“We couldn’t find a bartender,” he says. “My boyfriend was just grabbing us a drink.”

David nods. “There’s champagne by the piano,” he offers.

The woman nods at them and then walks away, presumably to find alcohol somewhere else. 

“One of the patrons of that gallery,” David says, before Patrick can ask. He takes another drink. “My mom mentioned she had RSVPed.”

Patrick thinks about what they looked like, David behind the bar and Patrick on his tiptoes leaning over it. “I’m sorry,” he says. “If that was—she must have thought that looked—”

David shakes his head and comes around the bar to lean into Patrick’s space again. “If she couldn’t figure that one out, then all the art she bought must have gone right over her head,” he murmurs.

Patrick lets himself be distracted. 

“Honestly, it probably went over her head anyway,” David said. “Very cerebral stuff.”

“Like your performances with your mom?” Patrick asks, faux-casual. “Are those cerebral, too?”

“Luckily for me, you’ll never find out. Those performances are strictly past tense.”

“But you practiced with your mom when we got here.”

David pushes at Patrick’s shoulder. Patrick tugs David toward him in response, wrapping himself up in David. 

“Patrick, honey,” David says, and Patrick tries to suppress his shudder at the pet name. David barely uses it, saving it for moments when Patrick needs to hear it or David needs to say it, like when Patrick’s overwrought from work or David’s had a few strong drinks. “I am not joking. If I take one step toward the piano, I need you to break one of my arms or knock me into the champagne fountain.”

“Got it.” Patrick is not going to laugh at David. 

When they finish their drinks, David taps at the bar again, then shifts away from Patrick like he’s going to make them another. But Patrick puts a hand on David’s chest. 

“I’ve got this one, I think.” He crosses behind the bar and follows the steps that he’s seen David go through dozens of times. A gimlet, he thinks, but with David’s taste overwriting it all. Most things are where he expects them to be, but he does have to hunt down a few sprigs of mint. Inexplicably, they’re by the orange peels. 

He grabs their drinks and hands one off to David. 

"How is it?" Patrick asks, trying not to let David know how important his answer is to him. 

David takes a sip and hums. "Minty," he says, scrunching up his nose. 

Patrick tries not to deflate too noticeably, but David must see something in his face because he wraps a hand around Patrick's own. 

"But a very solid first attempt. I had no idea you even knew what a muddler was, let alone how to use one." 

Patrick squeezes his boyfriend's fingers and stands taller. He takes a drink of his own cocktail and nods approvingly at the taste. "You use a muddler," he mumbles. "Of course I noticed."

David hums, mouth twisting up and tucking a smile away. 

Patrick takes another sip. 

“David.” Moira’s voice comes from behind Patrick. He tries not to jump; he doesn’t want to spill his drink. “I require your presence.”

David doesn’t move. “For what.”

“You extended an offer to spot me earlier. I should like to collect.”

“I already did that. And I can’t spot you now.” David’s shoulders go up. 

“David, it’s fine.” Patrick wants to see how this plays out. “If anyone else comes up and asks me to grab a tray and get back to work, I think I can fend them off.”

“Oh my god, imagine?” Moira chuckles.

Something twigs in Patrick's subconscious, because he's heard that word with that exact inflection before. He's basking in the pride of making David’s mom laugh or express any positive emotion toward him when he catches David’s eye. He and his mom really are so alike, all dressed in monochrome and—oh. That's where he's heard it before. He presses his cheek against David's shoulder for one quick—quick, so quick—second to hide his smile.

But then David’s pulled away by the arm, and Patrick hears him complaining about his mom stretching the fabric of his sleeve as he’s dragged toward the piano.

Patrick’s not alone for long. A man who, judging by the eyebrows and perfectly styled hair, can only be David’s father comes up to him. He nods toward where Moira and David are bickering and waving their arms at each other.

“They’ve always been cut from the same cloth.” He shakes his head, but he can’t keep his smile contained. “Johnny Rose.”

Patrick holds out his hand to shake Johnny’s. “Patrick Brewer.”

“And you’re staying with David?”

“Alexis,” he corrects.

Johnny looks confused, so Patrick takes pity on him. “I roomed with Ted in college. When I moved to Toronto, I started staying in his and Alexis’s spare room. I met David at The Inn.”

Johnny’s impressive eyebrows furrow. Patrick pushes down a smile at how very like both of his parents David is. Still, Patrick tries to listen to what his boyfriend’s dad is saying. “I thought David worked at a bar.”

“It is a bar,” Patrick says. “A bar called The Inn. I don’t get it either.”

“So you’ve seen David at work?” Johnny asks.

Patrick nods. “He’s really talented. I didn’t even think I liked mixed drinks until he made me one.”

Johnny’s stiff, but he leans forward. It doesn’t seem like he knows where the line is, or what he can ask without Patrick or, by proxy, David, getting mad.

Patrick keeps going. “Customers really rely on his taste. And the owner, Wendy. David has to keep her on an even keel sometimes. Rein in the ideas that are more...out there.”

“Really.”

“He’s designed signature cocktails for weddings and events, too.” Patrick could talk about David for hours. “I didn’t even know that there was a market for that. I have a friend who does the books for a wedding venue, though, and he said that area is pretty untapped.” 

Patrick needs to stop hanging out with Ted. The puns are just casual now.

“I can’t say I know much about that,” Johnny said. “We have a few investment properties we’re thinking of converting into event spaces. Weddings and such, you know. Does your friend just work at the one, or is there a larger group?”

And they’re off, talking about Patrick’s MBA, Johnny’s investment returns, and the shared drudgery of networking events. Patrick feels like he’s passed some kind of test, especially when Johnny’s gaze darts between Patrick and David, who’s still across the room. 

Moira’s playing something slow and mournful that sounds like a dirge on the piano now, but most guests aren’t paying her any mind.

“Danny Boy,” Johnny says, evidently catching the confusion on Patrick’s face. “A particular favorite of my wife’s. Means she’s almost ready to perform.”

Patrick turns his full attention to Moira and David. He feels a sense of camaraderie with Johnny, like the two of them are spectators to a particular kind of show, one that could last years. Moira stands and waves for David to sit at the piano bench.

Patrick snorts at the expression on David’s face. He looks like he’s sucking on a lemon.

“Cut from the same cloth,” Johnny says again. It’s fond, something Patrick’s mom says about him and his dad, but there’s something wistful in it, too. 

Patrick smiles and nods, then turns the conversation back to Johnny’s golf game. 

David comes back over a few minutes later, a little wild around the eyes. Patrick reflexively checks the room for—he doesn’t know who. Sebastien wouldn’t be here, and that’s the only person from David’s galleries that Patrick would recognize. 

“Patrick, didn’t you need to call your parents to wish them a merry Christmas?” 

Patrick shakes his head. “I was going to call closer to midnight. Family tradition. Why do you ask?” 

David hops from foot to foot, eyes darting toward the piano and back. “No reason.” He grimaces. 

A smile spreads across Patrick’s face, slow and bright. 

“David,” Patrick says. 

David closes his eyes. “Don’t,” he says. “Don’t make me say it.” 

“You said you wouldn’t perform with your mother if you were held at gunpoint.” 

“I am aware.” 

“You said,” Patrick says, glee evident in his voice, “that I should find a horse tranquilizer and stick it in your thigh if you even so much as thought about performing a Christmas medley in front of any living person.” 

“I don’t love that you think I’d require a horse tranquilizer.” 

“David?” Patrick asks. “Are you performing with your mom?”

If David’s resigned expression isn’t enough of an answer, Moira confirms the best news Patrick’s heard since David said he was a sure thing. 

She taps primly at a microphone near the piano and smiles widely. “Friends and acquaintances, my prodigal son has finally returned to perform this seminal classic with me.” 

There’s a whoop that Patrick would bet came from Alexis, judging from Ted’s red cheeks and David’s blistering glare in her general direction. 

Moira continues. “Everyone give David a round of applause.”

David grimaces and crosses the room to stand at his mother’s side. The music starts.

Patrick watches as his boyfriend recites clunky dialogue. He watches as David represses an eyeroll with what must take an impossible effort. He listens as David sings, off-key but like the words are carved into his brain. He doesn’t miss a beat, though he does miss a few notes. Patrick works his way around the perimeter of the room, eyes trained on David the whole time. 

He finally makes it to where Ted and Alexis are leaned against the wall. 

Patrick grips the sleeve of Alexis’s dress, and she turns to face him. “Alexis,” he whispers.

“I didn’t think you’d say a word during The Number,” she says. “It’s, like, prime blackmail material. Oh.” Her expression changes. “Do you need a distraction so you can still sleep in the same bed as David tonight? Because I can tell you about the time that—”

“Alexis,” Patrick says again. “Can you pinch me, please?”

“What? Oh my god, why?” 

“Because I think I’ve ascended to a new plane of existence,” Patrick says calmly. “This might be the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

Alexis blinks at him, hard, and then reaches out and boops his nose with a finger.

“Boop,” she says seriously, eyes wide. 

Patrick nods. Boop, indeed. He devotes his full attention to the rest of the performance. He needs to memorize every second.

Moira releases David after two encores, one of which was “on the house,” whatever that means. Alexis offers to buy Patrick a drink or ten and to let him hide out for a minute before he finds David so there are less eyes on him.

Patrick shakes his head firmly. “Excuse me,” he says, “but I’m going to go find him now.” 

He doesn’t want a drink. He can’t run the risk of forgetting or dulling this memory. He wants to hold this memory, perfect and pristine, in his head forever. 

“Are you sure?” Alexis asks. “The bartender is on break, but I could totally swipe you a bottle of something.”

“Right now, Alexis. I have to go right now.”

And then he gets David, and he gets David into the coatroom, pressed up against something that might be real fur. He stops for a second and leans away from where he’s trying to reacquaint himself with every centimeter of David’s mouth, panting. He pulls back to look David in the eyes. 

Then he has to tilt David’s head down so that he’s meeting Patrick’s eyes. There’s embarrassment still swirling there, and a flush from all the...movement? Patrick wants to call it choreography but he knows David would scoff at him. 

“David.” Patrick can’t hold all of the feelings he has for David inside him anymore, not after watching that. There’s something about the way David goes all in for the people he cares about that makes Patrick want to hold David to his chest for the rest of his life. Forever. The words are bubbling up, and he’s not going to be able to keep them in oh god they’re coming it’s happening. “I love you.” 

David rears back. “What?” He breathes. 

Patrick nods. “You heard me.” 

David’s brows furrow, and he looks intently at Patrick. Patrick lets him look. He wants David to see it all. 

“After that,” David murmurs. Patrick isn’t sure if it’s a question, and he opens his mouth to answer, but David keeps talking. “I mean, that’s. Thank you, obviously, wow. And I want to be cute and endearing about this and all, but seriously?”

Patrick can’t keep the smile from spreading across his face. He thinks about trying, but he doesn’t really want to. “Seriously.”

“Patrick, that is the most embarrassing thing I have ever done. Someone once broke up with me after I just _described_ The Number to them.”

“If you’re waiting for me to take it back, you’re going to be waiting for a while.”

“Okay,” David allows. “Guess there’s no accounting for taste.” 

Patrick exhales through his nose. Then he tries to show David just how good his taste is, both in boyfriends and places to make out with them. He feels a little thrill because he’s finally got a boy alone, hidden away from the rest of the party. He’s late, but the company is better than he could have hoped for.

David stops him before he can do some of his best work with a hand on the center of his chest. “Me too,” he says. 

And Patrick has to say it again. He says “I love you” and he means keep me. He says “I love you” and he means I never want to forget how you look right now, flushed and a little unsure but mostly so beautiful that my knees are wobbly. He says “I love you” and he means I will keep loving you even if you don’t want to hear that yet. I’ll tell you when you want to hear it, and then again and again and one more time for good luck. 

Then he tries to arrange David’s hair into some semblance of order and gets distracted for five more minutes. 

After David’s almost put back together, Patrick drags him along to find Alexis and clink a glass of champagne against her own. He lets the bubbles in the delicate glass match the fizzing on his skin, in his head. He leans into David and closes his eyes. The world is tilting in the dark behind his eyelids, but David’s got him.

***

"David," Moira drawls when they’re all sitting down to breakfast the next morning. She adds an ambitious number of syllables to her son’s name in a way that Patrick finds charming but inscrutable. "I think our public missed our vocal stylings." 

Patrick thinks he covers his snort with a cough, but it's a near thing. 

"That's certainly an opinion on what happened last night," David says. He's paying almost too much attention to the waffle in front of him. 

"Though your sartorial choices were certainly less inspired than previous iterations, I must say. Lacked something of your traditional flair." 

Patrick tries not to visibly perk up. 

"Yeah, David," Alexis says. "And your hair, too, huh? What ever happened with that?" Her voice is a little too innocent. 

Patrick tries not to show how upset he is that everyone gets to tease David but him. 

"Well, yes, I don't straighten my hair anymore, Alexis. Thank you so much, also, for making me say that out loud in front of Patrick." 

Alexis winks. Or she tries to. David puts down his fork and smiles. 

"But you'd know all about that," he says. "Ted, I'm sure you've seen those pictures of Alexis from when she dyed her hair neon green and then dyed it back." 

Alexis makes an affronted noise. 

"I had forgotten about that," Johnny murmurs, smiling into his coffee. 

Patrick squints at Alexis. He can't picture it. 

"From a box," David adds. He looks far too pleased with himself. 

Alexis splutters. "Well, you're the one who stole Mom's wigs for me for a month while I waited for it all to wash out," she says. 

Patrick looks back at Johnny. He's still smiling. It's a good story, Patrick thinks. But he doesn't really think that's why Johnny's smiling. 

Alexis seems to realize that she's said too much, and she and David both look to Moira, twin expressions of fear on their faces. 

"Oh, please," Moira scoffs. "As if a single grubby paw touches my wigs that I am not cognizant of. She needed them more than I at that particular juncture."

David excuses himself to pack up—why he unpacked, Patrick doesn’t understand—and Patrick’s about to follow when Moira grabs his arm. 

“It was truly lovely to have you confabulate with us.” 

“I had a great time,” Patrick says. He hopes that’s right. “I think David was happy you wanted him here.”

“Yes, well. I hold his attention to detail in the highest of regard.”

“I think he just wanted to know you missed him,” Patrick says carefully.

Moira looks at him like she’s breaking him into his component parts. She nods, whatever inspection she’s conducting apparently concluded.

“David always felt everything quite deeply.” Moira’s speaking even more slowly than usual. “He can’t compartmentalize like I do. That's why his dramatic performances were full of such foibles and such unrelenting earnestness; David felt it all.” She taps her chin. “He was never meant for the dramatic arts.”

Patrick swallows. “At least the two of you have The Number.”

Later, after they all pack into Patrick’s car and David’s mom pulls him aside to whisper something to David that makes him bite his lip and look over his shoulder at Patrick, David lets Alexis control the music. So Patrick shelves his playlist for next time, whenever that will be. At least his desire to show David has stopped being a constant thrum of anxiety. He lets himself think that he and David will have time. 

And now it’s his turn to get in on the teasing.

"So when did you and your mom start doing this, exactly?" He asks. 

"Oh, this is such a fun story, David," Alexis says. She shimmies in her seat. 

David rolls his eyes. "I was five, the first time.” 

Patrick wants to laugh, but he's too charmed by the idea of tiny David reciting his lines and singing along to Jingle Bells. He hopes video exists. Moira was there, so he thinks his odds are probably better than normal Rose childhood memories. 

"That's so nice, David," Ted says. "How many years have you done it, then?" 

David shoots him a glare. 

"You know what? Never mind."

“Did you, um,” Patrick takes a breath, careful of the harm his words might do, “did you...practice? Ever? With your mom?” He winces. He almost certainly missed the mark of interested and supportive boyfriend by at least two miles. 

To his relief, David laughs. “Oh my god, I hid in my mom’s shoe closet every time she mentioned rehearsing for four years.”

Patrick laughs too, hoping that it’s okay. “And your mom?” He asks. “What did she do when you took to her shoes for cover?” 

“Sang louder, of course.”

***

“Why are there only eleven of each kind of cookie?” 

“Stevie, that is such a good question.” Alexis puts her hand on Stevie’s arm. “I had to test all of Ted’s cookies. For quality control. It’s very important, otherwise there would be liability concerns.”

“Pretty sure that’s only for commercial bakeries, babe.” Ted sets another plate of cookies on the counter. “I didn’t really _knead_ quality control for party snacks.”

“No,” Alexis shakes her head. “Marissa at the bakery says you should always test for quality and allergens. God, what if Patrick had a peanut allergy?”

“Doing Instagram captions for a bakery doesn’t make you a baker,” David mutters. But he directs the comment mostly to Patrick. He’s a little too proud of Alexis to take the wind out of her sails. 

“I don’t have a peanut allergy,” Patrick assures Ted. 

Ted nods, relieved. “Good. I’m still saving up for my own practice, so I can’t really afford to deal with liability concerns.”

David pulls the drink jugs out of the fridge and jumps at the hands that fit into the space just above his hips. 

“What am I looking at here?” Patrick mumbles into his neck. 

“Wine cocktails, because it is early in the afternoon and I don’t want anyone to get catatonic drunk,” David says, looking at Stevie. 

“Smart. What’d you make?”

“One cocktail you’ll like and one you should avoid at all costs.” David nods first to the sangria on the left and then the pitcher that no one but him and Alexis should touch. He should probably put it back in the fridge. Just in case. 

“What is it?” 

“Sangria. Want a glass?”

“No, the other one.” 

Patrick reaches for the Rusty Nails that David made with Gloria Gregson’s soap opera wine in a moment of sentimental weakness. He and Alexis used to steal glasses from the table at their house before the Christmas party became the focus of the season. David decides to let Patrick try it and pours him a glass. Only partly because the face he’ll make is bound to be funny. Patrick closes his eyes and purses his lips after he takes a sip. David holds his hand out for the glass, and Patrick hands it over. 

“What is this made with?” Patrick keeps a surprisingly good poker face. 

Alexis grabs Patrick’s glass from David and takes a sip. “Oh my god, is that Touched with Grapes? Did you make those little drinks for me, David?”

David shifts, uncomfortable now that everyone’s eyes are on him. “Well, clearly I didn’t make them for Patrick.”

“It was good,” Patrick tries, because he’s got Good Sport written across his forehead, probably. 

Stevie claps a hand on Patrick’s shoulder. “I brought a whole case of wine. I normally do my 12 days of wine solo, but I thought that I might as well share.”

Patrick accepts a glass of red—that’s what the bottle says, just red—and secures a pinwheel cookie before Alexis does any more quality control. 

An hour or so later, after David and Stevie have monopolized the cheese plate (except for the bites of cheddar and apple David sneaks to Patrick), Ted claps his hands, in his element as the host of their little orphan gathering. “I just wanted to say that I’m so happy you’re all here. I hope you have a jolly good time.”

David bares his teeth in an approximation of a smile. It’s a holiday, and allowing this pun can be his second gift to Ted. Besides the embroidered scrubs with, god, puns on them. Kit-ten out of ten. Who is this person David’s become?

“And,” Alexis says, drawing out the word in a way that tells David she’s already had a few of the drinks he made her, “now it’s time for presents. We can start with the person who had me.”

Stevie raises her hand. “We have to sit down before I give you this.”

They arrange themselves in the living room. Stevie pulls David down next to her on the couch, and Patrick sits at David’s feet on the floor. Alexis leans into Patrick’s shoulder, her third—fourth?—drink in her hand. 

“David helped me pick it out,” Stevie says as she hands Alexis a neatly wrapped box. “So if you hate it, you know who to call.”

“Okay,” David jostles Stevie with his shoulder. “She’s not going to hate it. I’ve been picking out presents for her since I was seven.”

“David, that means you’re the one who got me that tangerine sweater. Not exactly a selling point.” 

David sighs. “That was Dad. I told him you were more of a winter.”

“I’m a summer!”

“Now that you have a spray tan, that is absolutely true.” David sips his drink and watches as Alexis opens the personalized business cards he helped Stevie design. Stevie even convinced him to use teal blue instead of the shades of gray he was going to go with. It fits, he thinks. They’re perfect for his sister, this woman who’s striking out and doing something that he’s preemptively proud of her for. 

“These are very on brand for me.” Alexis sounds more surprised than David would prefer, but he takes the compliment. She exclaims over the planner and pens, then stands up to hug Stevie and falls on her and David instead. 

“David designed them,” Stevie says. Like a traitor.

“I didn’t.” 

“I had to talk you out of black-and-white cards.” Stevie’s just saying this to get Alexis off of her, probably.

“See, now you know she’s lying.” David wriggles, but Alexis doesn’t move. “Have you ever known me to compromise on a color scheme?”

David pushes Alexis off of them gently and grabs the glass out of her hand. It’s a miracle she hasn’t already spilled. “Who did you have, Alexis?” 

Stevie glares at him. “You picked the stupid font.”

“You can’t prove anything,” David says cheerfully. “Alexis, the present?”

“Oh!” Alexis bounces up and grabs a present. She hands it to Patrick. “I promise it’s not more homework for you to help me with.”

Patrick fishes five boxes of chocolate graham crackers out of the bag and tips his head back laughing. David wants to bottle the sound. 

Alexis boops Patrick’s nose and tells him there’s something else in there. 

Patrick pulls out a hat with a blue bird on it. “This is…” Patrick looks like he might cry over a sports hat, which would be scary for David if it wasn’t so funny. His boyfriend is so weird. 

David doesn’t miss Ted’s puffed-up chest when Patrick thanks Alexis. 

Patrick wipes at his eyes and then hands David a small box. “I hope you like it,” he says, like David knows what to do with that. 

David has a terrible poker face, so he’s hoping fervently that Patrick got him a good gift. His mind wanders to the box tucked into his own pocket for later, where he’s holding two tickets to another show at the same comedy club. This time, he’ll actually be fun to be around, too.

He shakes his head. First, he has to open this gift and get through the exchange alive. _Thirty-dollar limit_ , he chants in his head as he rips paper off of an old shoebox, because economical, responsible Patrick reused it to hold his present. Inside, he finds a coffee grinder and some high-quality beans from a shop he remembers taking Patrick to, that morning when he had his interview. 

“That’s very sweet,” he says. He hopes he sounds less surprised than he feels, but Patrick did pretty well, considering. David’s gift still looks horrifyingly sentimental in comparison, but David clings to the three words Patrick said first last night and tries to breathe evenly. He runs a hand across Patrick’s head. “Thank you.”

Patrick beams like David knighted him with a hair pat. Maybe Patrick’s first quest could be refilling David’s drink.

“You’re welcome.”

Stevie elbows him. “Your turn, champ.”

David sits up straight and hands the bag with the scrubs inside it to Ted. Ted exclaims over the puns and looks terrifyingly misty-eyed, so David is thankful he didn’t send Patrick on that mission. He uses the refill to escape Ted’s open arms. 

He comes back just in time to see Ted hand a bag to Stevie. He leans against the wall and watches Ted watch Stevie open the poster he helped find and frame.

“David said you liked her music,” Ted says anxiously. His hands crumple a bit of wrapping paper, over and over. “I think _Lilith Fair_ is her best album,” he adds, just like David told him to. 

Stevie is still staring at the poster. David can’t see her face. Oh god, oh no, she’s going to hate him and Ted drank two bottles of her wine. David led Ted astray and Stevie’s going to hate them both now and—

“I love Sarah McLachlan,” Stevie says. 

She finally looks up. David sees something glint in her eyes before she blinks it away. 

Ted’s fingers go slack around the wrapping paper. “Stevie, that’s music to my ears.”

***

“You’re kind of quiet.”

“Thank you.” David puts his hand on Patrick’s.

Patrick’s eyebrows pull down. “For what?”

“No one’s ever said that to me before. It’s a fun and new experience, and you already got me a lovely gift, so this is just a bonus.”

Patrick tilts his head and takes David in. David, the person he loves. And the person he gets to tell about it, too. His skin is aflame where it meets David’s. 

“Why are you looking at me like we’re locked in the wig room and only I know the security code?”

Patrick just tugs on the hand David gave him until he has all of David in his lap. Then he’s buzzing at the feeling of his whole heart sitting astride him. 

David tilts his head down to kiss him. He pinned Patrick to the wall of his bedroom when they got back from Alexis and Ted’s. His lovely hands tugged and pulled and twisted until Patrick shook apart, all before he even got his shoes off. 

But before Patrick lets David thoroughly distract him, he puts a hand on David’s chest. “I have another gift for you. Call it a second bonus.”

David wiggles, which is a lot to do to Patrick’s poor lap. Patrick’s torn between arousal and fondness. He thinks it’s a feeling he’s going to become pretty familiar with. 

“Do I need to let you up to get it?” David asks.

Patrick would do a lot to keep David right where he is. “It’s, um. Can you reach it? It’s just on the end table there.”

David shifts to grab it, and Patrick takes a few centering breaths. Thank god Stevie went out for a post-family party drink with a few friends from her class. “Very nicely wrapped,” David says, examining the bag filled with pale blue tissue paper. 

“Thanks.” Patrick tries to stave off the nerves bubbling in his gut. He loves David, and David loves him. God, it’s probably stupid.

“Well, this is the first gift I haven’t bought myself in...five hours.” Patrick _knew_ he had seen David on a few websites taking advantage of post-holiday sales. “So thank you.” 

David pulls the paper out of the bag carefully and then unearths the frame Patrick had spent hours selecting. David has an exacting eye, and he just wants the gift to be right.

“Is this—” David’s breath catches.

Patrick clears his throat. “It’s from the day we got coffee. Before my interview?” He shakes his head. That day was probably unremarkable for David, but it put a lot of things into perspective for Patrick. There’s no way that day meant as much to Patrick as it did to David. “You might not remember.”

“Of course I remember. God, your stupid banana nut muffin.”

“Just because you wouldn’t know a good muffin flavor—”

“See, that’s where you’re wrong. I know many good muffin flavors. I’ve had a lot of experience sampling, too.” David clears his throat and traces over the line item for coffee cake through the glass of the frame. 

“Well, I love that muffin. That muffin made me realize how much I liked you. How much I needed to tell people.” Patrick pauses. “I don’t know if I’m saying this right.” 

“I can’t believe you kept the receipt. Actually, I can’t believe that was the day for you. I looked like such a mess that morning.”

“David.” Patrick grabs David’s face with both hands. His cheeks kind of smoosh. Patrick thinks that he can never again make a bet or take a gamble, because he’s spent every last bit of his luck. 

David’s mouth twists into that what-are-you-doing smile. 

“You ordered coffee cake that morning, even though you already had an obscenely sugary coffee.” 

David nods, as much as he can with his head held between Patrick’s steady hands. 

“You woke up early for me.” 

“I remember, Patrick. Do you think I don’t remember?” 

Patrick sighs. This is going to be harder than he thought. “I was so nervous, and you asked what you could do to make it easier. After waking up early and buying me breakfast.” 

“It was an important interview! You said that it was the best prospect you had.” 

“David.” Patrick leans in to kiss him, because his face is right there. “You should…” He doesn’t know what he can say before David gets squirmy. “You should know why it happened that day.” 

David bites his lip. “I might.” 

Patrick nods and leans in again. David’s face is still right there.


	8. dr. frankenstein

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is jazz hands too much for a thank you note? Thank you for reading this story, a labor of love that I'm thrilled to share with you.

“You said to surprise you!”

“I didn’t think it would be so spicy,” Patrick says. “It was delicious. I loved the jalapeño in there. But wow, that heat snuck up on me.”

David flutters around anxiously as Patrick drains his water glass. Before they were dating, when Patrick told David to surprise him, David wanted to scream, _you already have, you already are_. But he would never say that. “It’s an acquired taste, maybe.” 

“Maybe next time my ears won’t burn.” 

David runs a finger across the shell of his ear. “But they’re so cute when they get all red.” David finally unearths the milk from the fridge and pours Patrick a glass. 

“Hey,” Patrick says after he takes a sip and sighs. “I’m surprised.” 

“A good surprise?” David asks. 

“David Rose, everything about you is a good surprise.” 

And then David has to look away because he doesn’t trust what his face will do. Patrick says these horrifying, honest things to him in public, partly because he can’t keep the words inside of him and partly because he likes the way David gets sentimental and outraged in equal measure, David suspects. How dare Patrick make him tear up at work. 

“It’s sweet, really,” David says. He clears his throat. “It’s just also cruel, is all.” 

“However will you cope?” Patrick murmurs, then grips David’s hand and squeezes tight, just for a second. 

Then David huffs and turns to wash his hands before he gets back to making drinks. Patrick is one of the better things that has ever happened to him, but he’s also a monster. 

“Which one am I more of?” Patrick asks, because David’s filter has been malfunctioning around Patrick lately. 

“Definitely a monster.” 

“Well, then I guess I’d better go home now and leave you to your work.” Patrick leans back on his stool. “Can’t have you distracted by a monster.” 

“That’s not what I said, I don’t think,” David says too quickly. 

“No, it’s fine, my mouth is still on fire.” 

David hands him another cup of milk. It’s not like he’s going to use it for White Russians if he can help it. _The Big Lebowski_ is a treasure, if outside of his normal wheelhouse, but that drink is just objectively bad. Patrick takes the milk, a knowing look in his eyes. 

“Is that helping?” David asks. 

Patrick looks at David. His gaze starts at David's hands, which are resting on the counter in front of him, and stops at his eyes. David can’t keep eye contact for too long; Patrick’s seeing too much, or something. 

“You’re helping,” Patrick says. 

And David has no idea what to do with that.

***

“What do you want to do for your birthday?” 

“What do you mean?” David asks. They’re pretzeled together on the bed, with David’s head on Patrick’s chest and a library book in his hands. Patrick’s scrolling aimlessly through some documents for work on his phone. 

“I’m putting a moratorium on trips that require flying,” Patrick says, “but I could be persuaded to spend the night with you somewhere.” 

David gets a little shifty. “It falls on a Wednesday, so it’s going to be way too inconvenient to go anywhere, I think,” he says. “And I have to work, I’m pretty sure.” 

Patrick sets the phone on the bed and looks at David. “David. You requested the day off last month because there was a new Ariana Grande music video coming out and you wanted to give it your full attention.” 

David can’t even argue with that. It’s true. 

“You asked Wendy to trade shifts when I got tickets to see that a cappella group and didn’t check the date with you first.” 

David reexamines a lot of his life choices as Patrick keeps talking. 

“It’s way more than two weeks out. The schedule for your birthday hasn’t even been made yet. And if it’s that big a deal we can always celebrate a different day that week.” 

“It just seems like a lot of effort,” David finally says, once Patrick’s eyes have fully burned a hole through the side of his head. “And I would be perfectly happy with dinner here, or something.” 

Patrick grabs for David’s hand and holds it, the way he does when he thinks David might let go. Just shy of too tight. 

“You showed me a really nice time on my birthday,” Patrick says. “You split a bottle of wine with me and got me my gym bag. And you bought my drinks at that comedy show.” 

David shudders at the reminder of the hours he spent staring at the website before he pressed _order_. He is big enough to admit that he liked Patrick an embarrassing amount even then. “I know,” he says reluctantly. 

“We weren’t even dating on my birthday,” Patrick says patiently. “So I am requesting permission to celebrate you at least as much as you celebrated me before we were even dating.” 

David waves a hand, helpless to do more. Patrick’s earnestness is a lot to contend with at the best of times, let alone when it’s all directed on him like a ray gun. Then Patrick channels the full force of his eyes into something else, tracing a finger down David’s chest and pushing into David’s space. He grabs David’s book, ever careful with things that are even temporarily David’s, and sets it on the nightstand.

“What are you doing?” David asks. “I already said okay to your birthday thing.”

“And if I were to say that it’s so good of you to do that for me,” Patrick says, testing. 

David represses a shiver at the zing that cuts right through him. He’s heard every version of joke or tease about this particular inclination there is—didn’t your parents tell you nice things, couldn’t your parents pay someone to tell you nice things, oh my god you’re so insecure. 

But there’s nothing funny about the cries Patrick wrings from him, lips pressed against David’s ear whispering adoring filth as he fingers David open. He moves slowly despite the constant refrain of praise. Like he won’t run out of nice things to say, so he doesn’t need to rush.

***

In the grand tradition of Patrick’s plans falling through in the most embarrassing way possible, David’s birthday ends up looking much different than he expected. 

Patrick spills on his shirt and is late to pick David up because he has to run home and change after work. The place he picked for dinner—with creative input and a shortlist supplied by David—loses their reservation, because of course they do. 

But David is undeterred. He smiles and tells Patrick that there’s a pretty decent diner in that neighborhood. 

They go to a place with crooked frames on the walls and rips in the plastic covering the menus, and they split mozzarella sticks and a bottle of wine. It's not good food by any means. The mozzarella sticks are clearly from the frozen food aisle, and the wine is overpriced and way too fruity for David's tastes, no matter how determinedly he brushes off Patrick’s concerns. 

But it's still pretty great. 

And Patrick talks too fast as he promises to make it up to David another time, but David tells him that he liked it, that he doesn't want a do-over unless it comes with a second round of presents.

Patrick thinks that he’ll never understand David, but he never wants to stop trying.

***

“How’s the new job?”

“Lower stakes, that’s for sure.” Ronnie accepts the drink that David holds out and takes an impressive swig. “No one’s called me to rescue someone from the shipping container they sent themself to a different country in.”

“Well, it’s still early,” David says. “It’s been, what? Four months? Surely the chamber of commerce has its own emergencies.”

“About that.” Ronnie sets her glass down. It’s already empty, so David grabs the aquavit and starts making another. “I have something to run by you.”

“About what? Chamber of commerce emergencies?” It’s quiet in the bar tonight, so David pulls out a stool and sits next to Ronnie after he hands over her second drink.

“Something like that.” Ronnie rubs her palms against her denim-covered thighs. It’s still jarring to see her without her embassy pins. 

David makes an impatient motion. Ronnie’s managed to intrigue him.

“You know that my hometown is pretty small. There aren’t a lot of local businesses in town, but there’s a greater metro area that’s pretty lively.” At David’s raised eyebrow, Ronnie sighs. “Not by city standards. It’s a slower pace.”

“Okay.” 

“But the general store in Schitt’s Creek just announced it’s going out of business. And the chamber wants to find a good contender to take over the space. We need a place in town for people to buy essentials. No one wants to drive twenty minutes to pick up toilet paper.”

“That sounds less than ideal.” David wrinkles his nose. If the old general store was advertising toilet paper out in the open, it’s no wonder people were put off, but he doesn’t say that.

“But there’s enough room in the building for something special.”

David recognizes the glint in Ronnie’s eye. He saw it when she negotiated with that prince’s uncle and got Alexis on a red-eye back to Canada within a day. 

“Ronnie. Why are you telling me this?”

Ronnie holds up her hands. “I’ve heard some of your ideas for this place. They’re not bad.”

“Glowing praise,” David says cautiously.

“All I’m saying is that there might be room in town for two more.” Ronnie takes a drink, then smiles like she only does when she’s poking fun at Patrick. “Well, technically there’s only room for one and a half regular people, but your boyfriend is short and doesn’t have any personality. So he’d probably fit.”

“Just because he’s afraid to talk to you doesn’t mean he has no personality.” 

“That’s not a no.”

David hums. He would never have imagined this for himself. But then he thinks about Stevie’s meeting with the brand manager of a new motel chain tonight and Ted’s leads on locations for opening his own practice. There’s nothing holding him here as long as Patrick comes with him. But it’s a big ask. 

Still. “It’s not a no. I need to think about it some more, though. And talk to Patrick. We haven’t really been dating that long.”

“If that guy knows what’s good for him, he’d follow you anywhere. And David?” Ronnie toasts him with her half-full glass. “I think he knows what’s good for him.”

David toys with a napkin to hide the frisson of pleasure that courses through him at her words. But then he looks up. “What did you say the name of your hometown is?”

David feels like he’s going to vibrate out of his skin for the rest of the night. Ronnie talks him through the lease terms and shows him pictures of the space on her phone, and he was right. The current owners put drain cleaner next to the cereal, which is somehow worse than just putting toilet paper in the front of the store. And she teases the beginnings of an idea out of David, one where all of the artisans in the greater metro area that she swears exists could sell their wares in a central location. And the toilet paper and drain cleaner could be tucked away in the back of the store. He catches his breath when he starts talking about mood boards and branding.

He wants it.

By the time he gets home, he’s exhausted. The thought of cooking anything seems like a Herculean task, but he hasn’t eaten, so he resigns himself to at least putting together a grilled cheese or a bowl of cereal. 

But when he crosses the threshold of his apartment, his whole night turns around. Patrick’s there, leaned over the stove poking at something on the burner, and he looks up when he hears David come in. The smile Patrick gives him cracks open something in his heart. 

“Did I know I was seeing you tonight?” David toes off his shoes and sets his bag down. 

“I’m a surprise,” Patrick says. He rubs a hand over the back of his neck, which is redder than usual. Must be the heat of the stove making him flushed. 

“You said,” Patrick bites his lip, then takes a breath and keeps going. “You said you had a long day. And I know this isn’t like—it isn’t like that breakfast you made me. I can’t make any of your favorite foods. But I thought I could make you dinner. Just a simple dinner. It’s really. It’s nothing.” 

And David crosses the apartment to kiss each side of Patrick’s frown. Then he kisses Patrick squarely on the mouth, too. For balance, or something. 

“This is so far from nothing.” He says, fighting like mad to keep the wobble from his voice. “And hey.” He pulls back to look into Patrick’s eyes. “Pasta is one of my favorite foods.”

They open a bottle of wine and David tells Patrick about what Ronnie offered. He tries to limit himself to answering Patrick’s questions, but he can feel himself going off on tangents and getting too deep into the weeds like someone who’s actually going to do this. 

“We don’t have to decide now,” David says for the fifth time. “Really, we don’t. Ronnie said there aren’t any other applicants for the lease. A Christmas store seemed interested for a second, but they already backed out. We have time.”

He’s rambling. He closes his mouth before he can say how much he’s starting to want this.

Patrick smiles. “David. You seem really excited.”

David winces. “It’s okay if you’re not! We don’t have to do it. I just.” He talks slowly because he doesn’t know if he can find the right words. “I like the idea of creating something real.”

“I like it, too.” Patrick’s smile widens. “Did Ronnie say if we could tour the space? We should probably see the town before we decide.”

“I can call her. I can call her tomorrow.” David bites his lip. “This is a real possibility. You could maybe do this.”

Patrick grabs David’s hand. It should be annoying, because Patrick’s still technically cooking pasta. David does not want gummy, overcooked pasta. But instead, it’s soothing.

He takes a breath. “But you like your job.” He’d hate himself if he didn’t say it, but it still feels like he’s betraying their store. Their entirely theoretical, nonexistent store to which David is already far too attached.

“My job is fine,” Patrick says agreeably. “I never thought it would be that permanent, though. Remember, I said it was good for now?”

“I do remember that.” David looks toward his bedroom, where there’s a receipt framed on his nightstand. 

“I like the idea of something like this. For more than just for now.” Patrick’s as steady as he always is. Like David’s coming to expect him to be. 

David bites his lip and nods. “Mm hm.”

Patrick squeezes his hand and then goes to get the noodles off of the heat. 

David grabs a second bottle of wine.

***

“This is like,” David waves his fork a few minutes later, splattering sauce all over the counter, “the best pasta I’ve ever had.” He brings the utensil to his mouth and takes a bite. 

The moan he makes goes straight through Patrick, and he shifts in his seat. He swallows his own bite and feigns a chuckle. 

“You’ve had pasta from way better people than me,” Patrick says, twirling his fork in his bowl, spinning, spinning—the room is still spinning a little bit. “Professional chefs and like, Italy. You’ve been to Italy.” 

David drops his fork, and it clatters against the ceramic bowl. Patrick’s face is suddenly trapped, protected, held between two warm hands. 

“No better person,” David says gravely. “No better person has ever done this for me.” 

Patrick wants to lick the tiny bit of sauce at the corner of David’s mouth. He wants to chase the taste of the sauce against David’s tongue, how is it so good, it’s just a tiny jar. 

David drops his hands and picks up his fork again. “But if you find me the name of the person who came up with this recipe,” he trails off, squinting at the label.

***

Their trip to Schitt’s Creek is not off to an auspicious start. 

Patrick knocks on David’s apartment door bright and early, as agreed. Stevie answers. She’s still holding her pillow because post-graduation Stevie is finally taking some time for herself. He’s happy for her, but he’s also worried about why David didn’t answer the door or his texts.

“Is David almost ready?” He asks. 

Stevie shakes her head. “I refuse to wake him up. You know this.” 

Patrick sighs. Stevie offers him her pillow for protection, but he waves her off. His strategy is usually lower-impact. 

He has to pause for a minute when he opens the door, because for all that there’s irritation simmering in his belly at David’s tardiness, his boyfriend is always so soft and sleep-sweet in the morning. 

He knee-walks across the bed until his lips can brush David’s ear. “Hi, sleepy.” 

David grumbles. 

“It’s morning,” he tries again. 

“No,” David sighs. “Alarm didn’t go.” 

Patrick checks the nightstand for David’s phone. It’s fallen to the floor and off of its charger, which would explain the missed alarm. Patrick lets go of the residual irritation and presses his forehead to David’s. His boyfriend’s eyes are closed still, but his brow is creased in the way that means he’s close to wakefulness. 

“David,” he whispers. 

David blinks his eyes open, then sits up. “No, no, no.” He’s talking fast, but the words are blurring together. He’s still a few steps too close to sleep. “I set an alarm.” 

Patrick nods toward the phone on the floor. “And here I am, one personal alarm.” 

“Sorry,” David whispers. 

Patrick makes a noise of disagreement. “I’m not.”

And then they’re off, to hold a potential future up to the light together and see if it fits.

***

“Are you going to wake up before we get there?” 

David groans and contorts as much as the cramped seats of Patrick’s car will allow to twist the tension out of his back. “Awake.” He sighs. “I am, I’m up.”

“Nice of you to join me.”

“It’s not like I missed anything.” David looks out the passenger-side window. “Road. Trees. Grass. Any other highlights you’d like to run by me?”

“Nope. As long as you’re cool with the lower-back tattoo I got at the last rest stop.”

“So long as it’s sanitary. And tasteful.” 

“You’re asking a lot of a roadside tattoo.”

“Where are we, anyway?” David picks up his phone from the center console. The butterflies in his stomach woke up with him, and they’re getting vicious. Too long in an enclosed space, maybe. “Nope. Not helpful. Maps just says bumfuck, nowhere. Are you seeing this?”

Patrick knocks his phone out of his hand and grabs hold of him. “Hey. We don’t have to go if you don’t want to.”

“Why wouldn’t I want to go? We both took off work for this. We already reserved a room at that motel where one or both of us will get lice, or worse.”

“And you seem very confident in that decision.” Patrick rubs the wide, rough pad of his thumb against the juncture between David’s thumb and forefinger. David lets himself be soothed by it. “Not wild around the eyes at all.”

“Just running through tattoo possibilities. Animal, vegetable, or mineral?”

Patrick laughs through his nose in the way that David should really be more turned off by. As it stands, he just sinks into the feeling of being seen by the man in the driver’s seat. 

“What category does a TV show character fall into? And unrelatedly, how do you feel about Spongebob?”

David takes a deep breath and tries to remember that they’re joking. “Mm. A sponge is probably a vegetable.”

“It’s very tasteful.”

“I wish I could trust your judgment on matters of aesthetics.” David rubs his free hand against the ripped denim of his jeans. 

“This conversation bodes very well for the store we’re thinking of opening together.”

“I’d argue that clear expectations do bode well for going into business together. And I can’t imagine you thought you were going to be picking paint colors anyway.”

“You haven’t even seen the color story of my Spongebob tattoo, though.” Patrick takes his eyes off of the road for a moment and winks at him, badly. “No, I know. I’m here for grant writing and accounting. And occasionally talking you down from indecision spirals.”

“I resent that.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. Grant writing, accounting, inventory, and indecision spirals.”

David nods. “Much better.” Then, feeling bold and seen in a way he’s learning to luxuriate in rather than run away from, he lifts Patrick’s hand, which is still warm and tightly wrapped around his own, and kisses it. 

“David.” Patrick sighs. Then he shakes his head, like he’s refocusing on the road. “Looks like we’re almost there. That’s...a sign.”

“Oh, my god.” _This can’t be anything_ , David thinks as they drive past a frankly appalling billboard. “Too late to turn around?”

“But you promised me lice at a roadside motel.” Patrick sounds invested, and that’s dangerous for David. 

He’s never cared so much about making sure someone else gets what they want. The sign might still be a dealbreaker, but he can give it a real shot. “Well. If I promised.”

That afternoon, an enthusiastic man in a salmon-colored blazer chatters at them about rent that David doesn’t want him to say again in case he forgot a few zeroes. David looks at the whitewashed brick and poorly organized stock and leans his hip into Patrick’s. He’s almost dizzy with ideas for what this place could be. He’s had a similar feeling before, when he signed a transcendent artist and visions of their eventual showing would swirl through his head at breakneck speed. But this time, the ideas are slower and clearer. He feels more sure about where he’s going to put the register and, oh, maybe an apothecary table to display stock. The waves of indecision and the need to prove himself are still there, because he’s still the same person at his core, but they’re less focused on what his socialite friends would say or think. Or if they would say or think anything about him at all. 

“Can you excuse us for a moment, Ray?” Patrick says. He’s studying David as Ray smiles, presses a pair of complimentary keychains into Patrick’s hand, and goes across the street to what looks like the only restaurant in town for coffee. “You’re harder to read than usual.”

“We could do this,” David blurts. “We could—I mean, we have enough money for rent for at least six months. And you said—grants.” David’s been saving for a while, and he didn’t really know why. But looking around, he thinks maybe this was the reason. Maybe he was waiting for something like this. Something more. He winces and hopes that he doesn’t sound desperate. Patrick’s never complained about it before, but...you never know.

Patrick isn’t looking like him like he’s desperate, though. He kind of looks like David’s something he wants to keep looking at. “David.”

“If you want to,” David hurries to add. “I mean, we could if you want to. It could be something.” He clenches his hands into fists and then flexes his fingers, unsure what he’s reaching for.

“I want to.” Patrick says the words like they’re easy. Like deciding to be with David here would be easy. “We can do this.”

This could be something. David leans against Patrick’s strong, sure back and looks out the window over Patrick’s shoulder. It could be everything.

***

“What’s this place called again?”

“The Wobbly Elm.” Ronnie waves to the bartender.

David leans into Patrick. It’s a weird feeling to sit on the same side of the bar as each other. 

Ronnie hands them a menu, and Patrick thinks for a minute that the whole trip was wasted. There’s no way that David will stand for a cocktail menu that is nothing more than lemon drop shots and AMFs. 

But David never does what he expects. “I can’t believe how cheap White Claws are here. Thank god they have black cherry.”

Patrick has to kiss his boyfriend, even though they’re in public. Then he scans the bottles on the counter for something tolerable. 

Ronnie stands up to go place their order. 

“Feel like home?” Patrick teases.

The yellow lights wash out David’s complexion and the chairs are creaky. Still, Patrick likes how David looks here. 

“It’s not bad,” David says. He taps his chin. “I’m not going to complain about the price.”

“Selection leaves something to be desired,” Patrick says. He’s going to miss David’s drinks. 

“So we’ll get a bar cart.” David shrugs.

The realization hits Patrick that if they’re going to do this, they’ll probably move in together. Drink selection is suddenly much less important. They’ll have a bar cart. And he’ll have David.

Ronnie returns, hands David a white can, and sets Patrick’s glass on the counter. 

Progress, Patrick thinks. He didn’t expect her to place the order for him at all. 

David launches into conversation with the bartender, who is apparently named Mandy, and leans forward to prop his elbows on the table.

Ronnie takes a sip of her whiskey coke and wrinkles her nose. “I was sort of hoping he’d give her some tips on mixing drinks,” Ronnie mutters under her breath. 

They both look over at Mandy, who’s telling David that she still doesn’t know what a tequila sunrise is. She’s made ten different things for people who have ordered that, she says, and everyone just sort of drank whatever she gave them. It’s a scary amount of power for someone with such a heavy pour.

Patrick tries his 7&7 and pushes it away from him. “Maybe next time,” he offers. 

Ronnie shakes her head. “Guess I’ll have to find David whenever I want a good mixed drink.” 

Patrick’s looking at David, who’s telling the bartender the mechanical bull story, using his hands and making her laugh. Mandy tells David about the café in town where her cousin works. Apparently, they should avoid the smoothies. 

“I don’t think you’ll have to look far,” Patrick says. 

He can see them here. 

Ronnie nods. Patrick thinks that means she’s pleased. “Good. Having to go all the way to The Inn made his drinks the most expensive free ones I’d ever had."

They finish their drinks and talk through the logistics of applying for grants and signing leases. Patrick signals for the check and pays for all of them. 

David protests, but Ronnie doesn’t. She does clasp Patrick’s shoulder as she leaves, though. He thinks he’s winning her over. Or he hopes that he is.

“I still think I should have bought,” David’s saying. “We’re celebrating, after all.”

Patrick shakes his head. He remembers feeling uncertain and out of control in Toronto and all of the ways that David made everything okay. “I owe you a drink.”

“Why?” David tilts his head. “I would remember if I had won a bet.”

“David.” Patrick pours all the sureness he wants to sink into David’s bones into the word. “We said a while back that we’d make a guy who had it figured out pay. And he’s going to pay.”

Realization dawns on David’s face, and he smiles before it gets tucked up where he thinks Patrick can’t still see it. “I’m glad he’s here.”

Patrick blinks. His eyes are watering. “Me too.”

***

Patrick grabs the aux cord and plugs his phone into it the moment they get back in the car, after a middling night’s sleep in a room with a mirrored ceiling. The experience they had with the mirror was better than middling once Patrick pulled David on top of him. David got to look at Patrick while he rode him, and David didn’t let himself think too much about what exactly Patrick was seeing in that funhouse of a room. 

“Is this your subtle way of telling me you don’t want to listen to any more episodes of the Goop podcast?”

“I started putting this playlist together months ago,” Patrick says, undeterred. He hasn’t looked up from his phone screen. “I’ve been adding to it for a while.”

David loves Patrick, but he doesn’t know how long he’ll be able to listen to alt-folk this morning. “And while I admire your commitment to twangy guitars and a fiddle in that one song—”

“David.”

“Yes?”

Patrick turns to David and kisses him, hard. He puts his hand around the back of David’s head and really goes for it. Patrick is going to have to learn to only touch David’s hair when he can really commit to the idea. Far too soon and long after David’s lost all coherent thought, Patrick pulls back. “That’s the name of the playlist. David.”

“Oh.”

“That’s all you have to say?” Patrick’s being a shit, because he _knows_ what he does to David. “I tell you I’ve been working on a tribute to my feelings about you for months, and you just say ‘oh?’”

“I will generously allow you to play it?” David tries.

Patrick nods. “Better.”

David makes Patrick pull the car over a few songs in so he can show his appreciation. It takes a lot longer to get back to Toronto than they planned, but it’s worth it to hear so many artists say in so many ways how Patrick loves David. 

The best part is when Patrick sings along. David can’t believe he’s actively enjoying the feeling of someone singing at him. He doesn’t say that to Patrick though, because he doesn’t know what it might unleash. Instead, he makes Patrick pull over again a few hours later.

***

“David?” Stevie asks. Her voice is unassuming in a way that always spells fireworks. “Can I use boxed wine for this?”

Patrick’s not going to laugh. He’s already breaking David’s rule by leaning against the wall and listening in. 

But David’s handled this group remarkably well during the first of what Patrick hopes will be many mixology classes. Maybe he’ll let Mandy in for free if David can convince her to come.

Jocelyn, who Patrick is still getting used to even after a few months of her coming in and buying soy vanilla candles, claps her hands together. “Oh, I always use boxed wine in sangria. And they have cans of mandarin oranges at the store that are good in a pinch.”

“Have you ever done that, David?” Stevie asks innocently.

Patrick can’t hold in his chuckle. David levels a look his way that could peel paint, so Patrick holds up his hands and backs out of the room and down the stairs to the store floor. Most of their regulars are upstairs learning how to make sangria and old fashioneds, but a few customers trickle in. 

Ronnie’s one of them, and she holds up one of the premade cocktail mixes they’re trying out questioningly. 

“David’s idea,” Patrick says. “I think he’s getting sick of mixing drinks whenever we get invited to someone’s house for dinner.”

Ronnie tips her head back and cackles. “Nice. Unrelated: are you two free tomorrow night?”

Patrick grabs the bottle, eager to please. “We’ll bring this with us. No need to buy it.” He’ll probably never feel confident in their friendship, but he thinks that she probably likes it that way. 

Ronnie nods, seemingly pleased. “Will Stevie still be here tomorrow night? Tell her to come, too.” 

“Can do. Between you and me, she’s actually thinking of moving into our building.” Patrick taps his fingers against the register. He hates keeping secrets, but David told him and Stevie that neither of them were good at surprises when they tried to throw him a tiny belated birthday party. So they’re both taking this subterfuge seriously.

“Toronto rent too high for her?”

“She’s always traveling for that motel job.” Patrick has also seen how much David misses her. Stevie’s just like David, so she’s probably also opening a bottle of wine and moping while watching _The Bachelorette_ every Monday night. “And I think she’s a little too far away for comfort.”

“Good.” Ronnie’s smiling a secret smile. Patrick elects not to ask too many questions about her master plan. Especially because he has to get the store ready to close by the time the class ends. The drive to Elmdale is pretty long, and Alexis and Ted only have an hour for dinner between the time the practice closes and the strategy meeting Alexis has to host for her new PR job.

Patrick can’t wait for Stevie to be back. It’s great to be able to drive to Alexis and Ted, but they’ve all felt Stevie’s absence.

***

David still practices his art by mixing drinks when they have people over. He makes Mandy a tequila sunrise, and she nods at the taste. Then she shrugs. “I’m still going to make it my way. Orange juice?” She wrinkles her nose. “Really?”

And while David is finally free of Wendy’s more artistic whims, he still invites her to town to see the store and take a mixology class. 

He makes a move toward the bar cart to make her a vodka cranberry like usual, but she waves him off. 

“There’s no health inspector here,” she says. “Do you have pickles? I have a new recipe that I want your opinion on.”

David watches with horror, Patrick with barely restrained delight, as she shakes something together for them. It doesn’t look so bad, though.

“This one is a martini, but I used pickle juice instead of olive juice. I call it a pickle-tini.” 

Patrick takes a cautious sip, the betrayal of Fancy Margaritas still fresh, and then hums, surprised. “It’s pretty good, actually.” 

“Wendy, this drink already exists,” David says. 

“I know,” Wendy says. “I created it a month ago.” 

“No, I mean it’s more than a month old. Other people make it, too.” 

“I always thought of myself as a trendsetter.” 

David huffs and downs the rest of his drink.

***

One year after they open the store, when the jokes about a semi-firm opening have nearly died down, Patrick takes David to a bar in Elm Lake to celebrate. Because Patrick loves David and knows David would murder him if he did this at the Wobbly Elm. 

Patrick orders a glass of champagne, enunciating the start of the word carefully because they’ve been burned before, and David hums and asks for cabernet. 

Patrick shifts in his seat. “You’re sure you don’t also want champagne? It could be fun. We could celebrate together.”

“We can celebrate our first year in business with drinks we want.” David rolls his eyes. “That’s fun, too.”

Patrick presses his lips together and nods. 

David picks up his glass when it arrives to tap it against Patrick’s. Then he frowns when he hears the weird clinking sound. His eyes narrow, but he still takes a sip. Then he fishes the first glinting gold thing out of the wine. And the second one.

Patrick’s not even pretending to be busy; he’s openly watching David’s face go from confusion to surprise to dread. It’s okay. He’s pretty sure fondness and love are mixed up in there, too. 

“You wouldn’t actually do this.” David fishes out a third ring. “What am I saying? You totally would. This is exactly what you would do.”

Patrick would protest, but it’s true. When David gets the fourth and final ring out of his wine glass, Patrick drops to one knee. His pants can take it.

“Ew, Patrick, the floor.” But David’s smiling. And he’s turning one of the rings around and around in his hands. 

“David, you have to know that—“ he laughs. “Sorry, I didn’t think I would be this nervous.” 

David’s smiling at him, Patrick thinks, even though his hand is covering his mouth. Wine drips from his fingers onto the table, his lap, the floor. It’s a mess. It’s all such a perfect mess. 

“You need to know,” he says, getting back on track, “that I will always—“ 

“I can’t believe you did this.” David has no control over what he’s saying. Words spill out of him and land in front of Patrick, and he can only look on, horrified at his lack of filter. “I can’t believe you’re on the floor.” 

Patrick’s knee really is not loving the floor. “David. You have to—“ 

“No, I know,” David says. A noise that David will never admit is a sob makes it way from somewhere deep inside him. “I mean, not _no_ , obviously not no. Yes. It’s a yes. Of course it’s a yes. God. Your pants. This wine. Patrick.” 

And even though Patrick didn’t get to make his speech, he still can’t stop smiling as he uses the packet of wipes he tucked into his pocket to clean off the rings.

Because David called him the worst, but he still said yes.

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on tumblr at [fishyspots](https://fishyspots.tumblr.com/)!


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